


and the only solution was to stand and fight

by zinikornis



Series: and the only solution was (to stand and fight) [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Bucky Barnes Has PTSD, Dad Steve Rogers, Domestic Fluff, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, I'm Bad At Tagging, Lawyer Steve Rogers, M/M, Post-Serum Steve Rogers, most of the characters don't show up much
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-18
Updated: 2021-03-12
Packaged: 2021-03-16 22:07:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 22,280
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28838280
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zinikornis/pseuds/zinikornis
Summary: Steve Rogers and James “Bucky” Barnes meet when Steve takes up the client James works for. As it turns out, neither of them like this man very much. Several things come to light during the investigation of the case, both professional, both personal, for example that James does want children, contrary to his previous beliefs.OR: proof that Steve and Bucky are able to find each other in any universe (and fall in love in every one of them)
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers, Peggy Carter/Steve Rogers
Series: and the only solution was (to stand and fight) [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2210454
Comments: 6
Kudos: 30





	1. “the foe’s haughty host in dread silence”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Magyarul: [{ egy megoldás volt csak 1. }](https://andweweremadlyinlove.blogspot.com/2021/01/egy-megoldas-volt-csak-1.html)

# 

A rather happy Steve Rogers was sitting in the back of an expensive car in an expensive suit. The rain was knocking on the windshield lazily. Outside the tinted windows the city life that was bustling non-stop, well, it was bustling. Las Vegas was not the only city that never slept.

“So whatcha think of this whole DC mess?”

His driver who has become his best friend glanced at him in the rear-view mirror. “You know what I think. I’m just sorry I can’t continue reading now. Have you bought the latest Batgirl comic yet?”

“Naturally. You can borrow it if you’d like.”

“Only if you’re finished with it.”

“It’s okay. We’re starting from the very beginning with Sarah,” Steve smiled. “As a bedtime story. She asked.”

“Has she got over her flu?”

“Yeah, she went to school today. But I’ll need to find a new nanny,” he sighed. “Sharon is quitting soon. She decided she’s going to finish college.”

“I’m sure Mrs. Carter would like to watch Sarah.”

“It could be a good temporary solution, yes.”

“Wait, you’re not wanting me to volunteer, right? I mean, your little angel is lovely and all but I’ve got enough squeaking nestlings.”

“No,” Steve laughed, “I’m not expecting that from you.”

“Well, Mr. Rogers, we’re here.”

The car stopped in front of a monumental marble building. At the entrance, to which a long flight of broad stairs was leading up, men in fancy suits were talking. One of them, a rather obnoxious man, was gesturing wildly while swaying with his shiny briefcase dangerously. Steve frowned at him from behind the window.

With a sigh, he leaned forward to his friend’s right and patted his left shoulder. Although it was an old inside joke of theirs, the man still fell for it every time. “On your left,” Steve laughed and grabbed his bag. “Thanks, Sam. I’ll text you.”

He got out of the car, shut the door behind himself, and walked up the stairs energetically. Once within earshot, he yelled to his opponent with an elegant, victorious face: “Hey, Sitwell, it’s surprising seeing you here. I thought you’d let someone else do the dirty work again.”

After winning the case ‒ as usual ‒, Sam took him from court to his workplace. At the desk in front of his office, they grinned at each other with Maria.

“I’m not even going to ask how it went.”

Agreeing, Steve smirked at her.

The woman grabbed the phone with her long, ringed fingers, and dialed. “Mr. Rogers arrived, sir. Should I send him in now?”

Steve waited for the response with raised eyebrows.

“Boss wanted to see you while you were away. Could you please visit him in his office?”

“I could please visit him,” Steve sasseed politely, and turned around.

In front of the huge, modern office on the top floor, he nodded to Pepper. She was scanning the monitor of her computer while discussing something professional with the phone she was holding on her shoulder, making notes with one hand routinely and signaling to Steve with the other that he could go in.

Steve, even with all his IQ, couldn’t figure out how she was able to do that.

Tony Stark inherited the company from his father, the company that has made both of them billionaires. They were inventors, really, engineers of the field of law. They held multiple seminars about the father-son duo on Harvard. Tony was popular in all media types, he has been on tv and other portals. Although his father was also famous for his charm similar to Tony’s, unfortunately he passed away some years earlier, thus leaving the management of his company and hardships of being a public figure to Tony.

“Hello, Tony.”

“Ah, Steve, come in, have a seat. How did your morning meeting go? Fine, I suppose?”

“You know me,” Steve spread his arms. “I always win. That’s why you employ me.”

Tony nodded, thinking. “Alright, that’s enough of small talk, you know I hate it. Let’s cut to the point. We’ve been contacted by a doctor. His company is being sued from basically every direction. He wants you.”

“Okaaaay,” Steve answered. “You could’ve given the folder to Maria, as usual.”

“I could’ve but then would’ve stormed back in here with it. I’ve spared you a round.”

“Oh,” Steve realized. Then he added: “Oh.”

Tony passed him the files. “Dr. Arnim Zola, chemist and doctor, founder of his company called HYDRA. They have units all over the country. Several inventions are attached to his name but the people suing him report that even though his products do indeed help at first, they actually make their situations worse in the not-so-long term. According to them, the blood of hundreds is on Zola’s hands.”

Steve clicked his tongue tensely, closed the thick folder and placed it on the table. He stared at Tony, determined, and the man started massaging his forehead briefly. For those few moments, he looked sincerely tired.

“Tony, you know why I chose to be a lawyer. So I could protect and serve my country. It is against my beliefs to protect a man who‒”

“I know, I know, spare the whole high and mighty thing. Look, I don’t want to fight with you on this. Zola asked for you specifically on this. He said only you can save his company. You can’t be sure at all he’s not the innocent one in this. Don’t be so quick to judge. Could you at least meet him?”

Steve took the folder again and started turning the closely written pages. He had a bad feeling about this but agreed reluctantly.

He was heading towards the door when Tony added: “Oh, and Steve? There’s a new intern, Peter. I assigned him to you.”

Steve smiled back at him politely before stepping out of the room. He nodded to Pepper again who was already getting up to her feet to walk in (Steve catched the movement of her hands carefully arranging her cleavage), and got into the elevator. Getting out of the small metal box ‒ he has made several complaints to the music ‒, he found himself standing across nervous freckles.

“Mr. Rogers? I’m Peter, the new intern,” the teenage-looking boy under the freckles extended his trembling hand. With the other, he was pressing a bunch of papers to his chest.

Steve hid his surprise under a cool smile. “Nice to meet you, Peter. Call me Steve.”

Now the boy seemed even more excited. “Seriously? I mean, yes, thank you, nice to meet you too.  _ Steve. _ You know, I, uhm, have read a lot about you‒ No, this is not right, no. I’ll stay with the Mr. Rogers thing for a little longer.” The boy turned red.

“As you wish, Peter,” Steve patted his shoulder. He couldn’t believe this kid in front of him was in fact an adult. “What college are you attending?” He thought if he heard it from the boy himself, he could be convinced.

“I have a degree from Harvard,” said Peter proudly.

_ He graduated. _

“Congratulations,” congratulated Steve. “Well, let’s get to work. We’ve got a case.”

“Oh yes, I’ve read the file. Dr. Zola seems like a… uhm, interesting person.”

“Sadly, I agree.”

He glanced at his watch as he was getting out of the car. He was going to have to pay the extra hours to Sharon again. The problem wasn’t the money, not at all, but instead the guilt that he’s kept her overtime, not as they originally agreed. Surely, she’s got used to it by now…

As he was searching for his keys in front of the door, he gazed up at the dark sky. It was chilly ‒ winter was coming ‒ but he wasn’t cold yet without a coat. He just found his keys when a car pulled up on the neighbour’s driveway after a sharp turn. He waved to him, then he, as a checklist: entered the house, closed the door, took off his shoes, and put his bag on the kitchen table.

A blonde girl was running towards him, shouting: “Daddyyy!” Steve crouched down and the little girl jumped to his arms.

“Hi honey. Did you have a good day?”

“Yeees! Shae and I saw a green dog!”

Steve looked up, laughing.

“Its fur was painted green,” explained the woman leaning against the door jamb.

Steve stood up. “I’m sorry for the overtime, again.”

“No worries, at least I’ll have more money for college,” grinned Sharon.

Steve hemmed, grabbed his bag, and, passing the woman, he went to his study through the living room, where he dropped the sack filled with papers and all his problems.

Shutting the door on it, he went back to the living room. The other two were gone.

He followed the voices coming from the room at the end of the hallway. Sharon was sitting on the car-themed, street-patterned children’s carpet, giggling while trying to free the laughing Sarah’s head from her frilly t-shirt.

“She wanted to wait for you,” apologised Sharon as she finally managed to put a unicorn pajama on the kid.

“I’ll take it from here, thank you. We can’t miss today’s bedtime story, right?”

“Yaaay, story!”

Steve sent the girl to brush her teeth, and went out to the kitchen, followed by Sharon. He kept the flower-decorated porcelain box containing the nanny money on the top shelf. It squeaked as it was opened. He calculated the fee, grabbed some more dollars and handed it to Sharon. The woman pocketed it shyly.

“Thanks.”

“No, thank  _ you. _ Did you have fun?”

“Oh, I couldn’t get bored of Sarah! Not only is she an angel but she can always come up with something new. I’m sorry I have to leave her but I just won’t have time beside college…”

“You know you can visit her whenever you want to.” Steve squeezed the woman’s soft hand gently. “I’m sure Sarah would love to see you any time.”

Sharon stared at their hands. Steve came to himself and drew away his own.

“Oh, I‒ sorry, I didn’t mean to be impolite.”

She was now staring into his eyes ‒ then he suddenly stumbled upon the realization that their lips were pressed together.

Steve gently pushed the woman away from himself and cleared his throat  _ (no, you can’t) _ , and began to wonder what is one supposed to say in a situation like this but Sharon rushed down the hallway with a flushed face, put on her shoes within quick moments, and called back: “Uhm, good night” before disappearing behind the front door.

Steve blinked. Yes.  _ Uhm, good night to you too. _

“Daddy,” Sarah showed up, “I brushed my teeth. Look!”

She snarled at him and Steve laughed.

“Good job, honey. Come on now, let’s read a story.”


	2. “half conceals, half discloses”

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Buckle up guys, we meet Bucky now!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Magyarul: [{ egy megoldás volt csak 2. }](https://andweweremadlyinlove.blogspot.com/2021/01/egy-megoldas-volt-csak-2.html)

Steve rolled to his back lazily as he managed to turn off the alarm on the third try, and he glanced to his right.

The space of his wife has been untouched for years now, her pillow was sitting neatly; Steve still slept only on his side of the bed, and for a brief while every morning ‒ which meant only seconds now, really ‒ his first thought was still to caress Peggy’s perfect hair.

He stroked his upper body, then his hands traced lower. He hesitated for a few moments but he finally pulled his hand from under the blanket, got out of bed sleepily, and went to the bathroom. It is simpler and cleaner to do in the shower instead, he thought.

He stepped out of the bathroom with a towel around his waist and a smoothed out face.

He made a by-pass to his daughter’s room: the kid was peacefully sleeping in her bed. Steve smiled softly and returned to his room.

Sharon was going to arrive soon, and Steve may have had some time today to eat breakfast together, the three of them. They were both adults enough to be able to talk about yesterday’s incident, it didn’t have to stand in Sharon’s way.

After putting on a flannel robe, he marched to the kitchen to prepare breakfast. Glancing at his phone, he noticed a text from Sharon.

_ “Steve, I know it’s very last minute but I can’t go anymore because of what happened yesterday. It is a big deal for me because I crossed a line I set for myself. I guess I’m saying goodbye earlier than I thought. I’m sorry. I hope you’ll be able to figure something out for Sarah, and if you’re not mad at me after this, I would be happy to take on your offer and visit her sometimes. Take care. ‒ Sharon” _

Steve usually didn’t curse but now he had the dang-it on the tip of his tongue. Finally he just let out a long, tense breath.

It would be unnecessary to disturb Amanda this early, she couldn’t make it in time to look after her granddaughter today; he’ll call her later during the day, maybe she could come starting tomorrow. Temporarily, of course ‒ he was perfectly capable of handling his tasks on his own, thank you very much.

As he was cooking eggs, he was wondering who else could he ask to watch Sarah for a day.

He called those few people he could think of while setting the table but nobody was available this spontaneously, as Steve expected, sadly. He threw himself on a chair.

“Are you okay, dad?” asked Sarah sleepily, rubbing her eyes. She was holding her teddy bear in her hand.

Steve snapped to attention. He immediately cheered up at the sight of his daughter. “Yeah, everything’s fine. Good morning, come here.” He opened his arms and the girl snuggled into the warmth of her dad’s fluffy robe. She yawned. “Did you sleep well, honey?”

“Uhum.”

The man, not fully present, was caressing the girl’s silky hair. It reminded him of Peggy’s. “Did you have a dream?”

“Uhum.”

“Hey, don’t fall asleep. Let’s have breakfast, okay?”

Sarah got out of her father’s lap and dutifully climbed on her chair.

During the clinking of their forks Steve cleared his throat and announced that she was going to come to his office today after school.

Sarah’s eyes sparkled. “Really? I can go with you to work? Yaaay!”

The line was busy when Steve called Amanda. Frustrated, he noted he would have to try again later but soon enough so the woman could pack and get here by tomorrow.

“Good morning, Mr. Rogers. I arranged a meeting with Dr. Zola for today as you asked. He’s coming at noon.”

“Great, thanks Peter. Please, get the papers by then, everything should be ready to sign.”

“Yes, sir.”

“No need for a salute…”

Peter blushed but laughed at the joke. Or at least he figured it was a joke.

Steve automatically stopped in front of his office to chat to Maria; just to be sure, he checked in with her too if she knew someone who could look after Sarah but, as expected, the answer was negative.

He initiated two more calls to Amanda until noon, failing both times. Steve was beginning to worry.

However, he tried to banish the troubling thoughts for now as his job required him to stand before clients with a clear head. He closed his eyes and took a few deep breaths. He concentrated his mind on Zola and HYDRA. Although this certainly did not help his levels of anxiety, at least it was of professional matters now.

“Steve, Peter is here,” informed him Maria’s voice on the phone. He didn’t even realize he picked it up ‒ he had to do something to become more present.

“Let him in.”

The boy sheepishly walked in and looked around with admiration.

“If you work hard enough, one day you’ll have something like this.”

“I’ve read a lot about your determination and optimism, Mr. Rogers.”

Steve pulled out a chair at the table in the middle of the room. “Have a seat.” He could almost physically feel the boy’s nervousness so Steve calmed him: “Relax, I’ll be doing most of it.”

Peter wasn’t calmed. “ _ Most _ of it?”

The phone rang, and Maria announced Dr. Zola ‒ however, when the bespectacled, and, it had to be admitted, funny-faced old man stepped in, a tall, auburn-haired, grim-looking man followed him.

Steve peered at the man in confusion for a moment (just enough time for a thought to cross his mind about how handsome this man was, then he forced himself to not stare too long at his left arm, or don’t stare at all, for that matter).

He put on his confident business smile, and extended his hand, first to Zola.

“Dr. Zola, welcome.” Turning to the dark-clothed, dark-haired, dark-faced man, he offered a hand also. “I’m Steve Rogers.”

“James Buchanan Barnes,” stated the stranger while dutifully accepting the handshake. His grip was slightly too strong and his palm slightly more callused than what Steve was used to.

After waiting for a little amount of time in hopes of getting some kind of explanation about the unidentified man, he cleared his throat and put a hand on Peter’s shoulder.

“This is my intern, Peter…” And at that instant, he had to realize, to his embarrassment, that he didn’t know the kid’s last name. He shot a helpless glare at him.

“Uhm, Peter Parker, hello.”

Steve motioned towards the table. “Well, let’s sit down, gentlemen.”

Zola, Peter and himself did so. The shadow stayed beside the door. Steve looked at him questioningly, but the experience was similar to eyeing the wall, so he turned to Zola.

“Doesn’t Mr. Barnes wish to join us?”

“Oh, excuse my rudeness,” giggled Zola. “James is only here to keep me safe. Not that I’m assuming anything negative of you but I’m not exactly popular right now. That’s why I’m here, after all.”

“I see, so he’s your bodyguard.” Steve’s gaze wandered back to the figure at the door once again. How could he stand so still? “Well, let’s hope we can save you from your enemies, Dr. Zola,” said Steve, doubting the amount of truth in that sentence.

The meeting took up more time than Steve had planned, and by the end, he was getting more and more confident about the hunch that Zola was not the kind of person he wanted to protect. Not only was he constantly interrupting him and kept talking about his “famous project” for about half an hour but, beside all that, he was giving broad, witty answers to Steve’s questions which made his job much harder. In order to be able to protect this man, his job was to know everything that could possibly be brought up against him. And it definitely seemed like Zola had many of those ‒ but he didn’t want to discuss any of them clearly.

He and Peter were going to have a whole lot to do.

Some time before three Steve jumped up; he realized he had to pick up Sarah.

Answering the others’ curious looks, he informed Zola that,  _ much to his sorrow, _ this meeting had to be over now, and that he could make a follow-up appointment with Maria.

He politely shook hands with everyone (maybe a little longer with James than it was necessary), and he waited for all of them to finally get out of his office. He covered his impatience with a smile rivaling that of Mona Lisa.

When Zola striked up a conversation with Maria at last, Steve patted Peter’s back incidentally and headed to the elevator.

His car was ready and waiting for him at the entrance (thank goodness he was smart enough in the morning to tell Sam about the time they had to go pick up his daughter). He threw himself on the backseat. Sam noted they were a little late, to which Steve noted with a tense laugh of some sort that his new client was insufferable.

On the way back, Sarah’s chatter filled the car, she was obviously excited she could finally take a peek at dad’s office. Steve was mulling how excessive workload he had now with Zola not talking efficiently, and in order for him to be able to get on with that, he had to occupy Sarah’s attention with something.

Steve walked through the building with a small pink bag on his shoulder and with Sarah’s hand in his own. The girl’s presence attracted eyes and people, naturally, thus it took up more time for them to get to his floor than usual.

At Maria’s table they stopped a little ‒ Steve chatted while Sarah was one by one handing him candies and lollipops she collected on their way up which he was feeding to her bag assiduously.

As Steve and Sarah entered the office, he spotted a figure in the corner gazing at the view from the window. Steve automatically stepped in front of her daughter protectively.

Then he recognized the metallic sparkle of the left arm. “Mr. Barnes?”

The man turned around. “James.”

“Steve,” he nodded. “Can I assist you in something?”

James was glaring at the carpet in reverie. Before he had a chance to speak though ‒ if he was even about to ‒, Sarah’s head popped up from behind Steve’s legs, and she pointed at the stranger in awe.

“That guy has a silver arm!”

“Sarah,” hissed Steve, “that is totally inappropriate‒”

“It’s okay,” muttered James, and tried to smile at the girl, in spite of being obviously anxious. “It’s metal.” His voice was surprisingly kind now that he’s said more than one word.

Sarah wandered closer. “Whoa! Dad, I want one too!”

“Write a letter to Santa because I don’t know where to find one,” giggled Steve.

“Mine’s from Russia,” James rushed to his help. “I’ve got a star too.” Pulling up his t-shirt, a red star on his shoulder was revealed indeed. “People generally despise it so I usually try to keep it covered up.”

“I like stars,” Sarah reassures him. “Can I touch your hand?”

James seemed disconcerted but crouched down and extended his left. The girl, sitting down on the ground, began to examine the strange limb.

“How can you move it? Ooo, are you a robot?”

“Something like that,” laughed James; it was short and dry, as if he hadn’t done this for a long time. Judging from his looks, Steve wasn’t surprised.

“Sarah, you forgot to introduce yourself,” Steve reminded her. “You didn’t even say hello.”

The girl let go of the metal arm unwillingly. “Hello. I’m Sarah Rogers.”

“Hey,” smiled the man. “James Buchanan Barnes.”

“Even your name is cool,” purred Sarah with utter enchantment by the man’s whole presence, and was close to melting right there from all the admiration. “Your nickname is going to be Bucky.”

Steve smiled softly ‒ the girl couldn’t know but this word used to be associated with gays. Of course he wouldn’t be opposed to that, he thought, then he also thought of how long ago it was since he was a horny teenager.

Evidently James had similar ideas running in his head because he blushed.

“Does Steve have a nickname too?” he asked at last, half from Sarah, half from Steve.

“Well, he’s just dad. And sometimes when he’s good, daddy.”

“Hmm,” grinned James somewhat ungainly and looked right into Steve’s eyes. “ _ Daddy. _ ”

Now it was Steve’s turn to blush and he, additionally, coughed a little. He quickly tried to think of something to say.

“So, end of your shift?”

Steve beckoned to the couch at the far-end of the office and approached it. He sat on its left corner; James was hesitating then sat down on the right.

“Yeah, from here Zola gets into his car and his driver is delivering him right on his doorstep.”

He watched as James’ face went darker during speaking, and he thought he could hear some negative overtones in his words as well. He didn’t know how to ask about it or if he should ask at all.

James’ stare was once again fixed on the carpet in the cloud of his brainwork. He looked like he really wanted to blurt out something but there was an obstacle in the way of his words.

“Oh, dad,” yelled Sarah and Steve’s head snapped up. The girl was sitting on the ground where they left her, rummaging in her bag, then she ran to him with a victorious look and a sheet of paper. “I almost forgot!”

Steve held the paper so James could see too, and after failing in figuring out what the drawing was portraying, he shot a desperate glare at the other man. James seemed similarly helpless.

“Thank you, honey.”

Sarah rolled her eyes and started pointing at the drawing. “This is you. This is me. And this whole thing is your office. See, there’s your desk and everything. I’m sorry you’re not in it, Bucky, I didn’t know you’d be here.”

The man waved his hand understandingly.

“Ah,” Steve wrinkled his forehead, “now I see.”

“I was waiting for you to pick me up the whole day,” said Sarah excitedly then turned to James. “The whole day, I was waiting for him to pick me up. Did you know I’ve never been here? I told all my classmates that I was going to see dad’s office today. And that dad is a lawyer. Claire asked what is lawyering,” she turned to Steve, “and I told her that you’re protecting the whole country from bad people.”

Steve nodded, giggling. “That is my goal. But honey, I’d like you to do something on your own now, okay? I need to work.”

Sarah raised an eyebrow, and, as if seeing right through him, she asked the rhetorical question: “Work, huh?” Then she walked back to her bag.

Well, yes, first of all, he wasn’t sure why this visitor was really here for, and then of course there was the fact that he was enjoying this conversation more than he was probably supposed to.

“You’ve got an amazing daughter.”

“Thank you.”

“No, truly. I mean I’m usually pretty clumsy with children. Most of them are afraid of me because… well, I can’t blame them. I wear dark clothes, I have a metal arm, and I don’t talk much. But I wanted to say this now. We’re somehow on the same note with her. Or, really, your daughter is special.”

“You left out mentioning your scary gaze,” joked Steve. He then nodded gently. “She learned not to get scared easily from her mother.”

“Sounds like a great woman.”

“She was.”

“Oh. I’m sorry.”

Steve’s heart got heavier. “It happened years ago. And, honestly, we both knew she was too reckless to have a job like that‒” He got quiet for a little, then explained: “She was in the navy. Agent Peggy Carter. She was somewhat famous in her field.”

“She was protecting the country too,” smiled James, referring to Sarah’s explanation of lawyers.

“Since you’re best friends now, I am actually looking for a nanny,” said Steve, mostly as a joke. “The previous one quit this morning. That’s why I had to bring Sarah in today.”

“I’m happy to accept the job if it fits beside Zola.”

Steve was blinking in surprise for a while before he gathered, well,  _ some  _ words.

“What‒ I was just kidding‒”

“Obviously not well,” bantered James. “But as I mentioned. You’ve got a special daughter. If you agree, I’d like to spend more time with her.”

Steve squinted ever-so-visibly and looked the man up and down. He liked him, even though he couldn’t have explained why ‒ after all, he didn’t know anything about him. If it would’ve been anyone else, he would’ve thought about it twice (and more) exactly because of that. But he felt like he had known this man for at least a century.

“How about coming over this weekend? We’ll see the outcome. If it goes well, your weekends are free, she would only need your company after school.”

“Sounds good,” nodded James. “What will you do with her tomorrow?”

Steve sighed. “I was planning on calling my mother-in-law as a temporary solution because I didn’t think I’d find a volunteer this soon‒”

“You  _ may  _ have found one,” corrected James.

“You’re right, you’ll still have to prove your worth.” Steve raised an eyebrow. “Anyway, tomorrow’s Friday, I won’t drag her here for one day so I guess I’ll bring Sarah here again. Then we’ll see.” Steve wrinkled his forehead wearily. “I hope she’ll be fine on her own because Zola gave us a tremendous amount of work.”

“He’s not an easy one,” hemmed James with a grim look. “Khm, I won’t keep you then.” He jumped up,  _ stand at attention, _ and reached for his hand. “It was nice meeting you, Steve.”

Steve hesitantly shook James’ hand with one, and placed the other on it, pressing him to stay. “You haven’t even told me why you came. Or stayed.”

James put on an apologetic half-smile that moved up to his beautiful gloomy-blue eyes too, and this somehow resulted in Steve feeling like his heart had been squeezed and twisted and crumpled.

“Maybe next time.”

Steve nodded in confusion.

As James was heading towards the door, Sarah stopped him to say goodbye.

Meanwhile Steve realized he should give this man his number because of the weekend, and he grabbed a card from his desk. Rushing to the door, he handed it to James.

“Text me when you know what time you can come on Saturday.”

James nodded with a smile and exited the office.

When Steve entered his house that day, he felt guilty, and the feeling didn’t cease to exist until the next morning.

Maybe he was just afraid to lose this nanny too. Maybe.


	3. “in full glory reflected”

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Okay so things heat up a little I guess... ;3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Magyarul: [{ egy megoldás volt csak 3. }](https://andweweremadlyinlove.blogspot.com/2021/01/egy-megoldas-volt-csak-3.html)

Steve woke up earlier this sunny Saturday morning than he usually did on weekends.

Happy ballads of birds were coming through from outside, and the early risers were already roaming the streets with their satisfied dogs. Glancing at the screen of his phone, he discovered it wasn’t even eight yet ‒ it was pointless to think of sleeping however: he was too excited, in a good and bad and every kind of sense.

He practically jumped out of bed, straightened the blanket and arranged the pillows, put on his robe, and silently went on an expedition in the apartment. Although yesterday afternoon he had vacuumed and cleaned every nook and cranny ‒ Sarah, thinking it strange, had watched his dad for a while, then offered her help, so finally they had cleaned the apartment together while listening to music and laughing a lot ‒, he wanted to double-check if everything was perfect. Of course ‒ _of course_ ‒ it wasn’t, he found details he didn’t like so much, so he organized, dusted, wiped some more, then got to washing yesterday’s dishes.

The voice of his daughter woke him from his thoughts. “When is Bucky coming?”

Steve glanced at the clock on the wall. His eyes widened. “Oh, uhm. He’ll be here in ten.” He hadn’t noticed being so deep in work but now he was sweaty, so he felt compelled to clean himself. “Sweety,” he kissed Sarah’s head, “I’ll go take a shower real quick, and then we’ll eat with Bucky, okay?”

“Okay,” nodded Sarah. Steve headed to the bathroom. “Daddy?”

“Hm?”

“You called him Bucky.”

“Oh.”

They stared at each other for a moment. Steve was the first to turn away, with a frown. He was beginning to feel like his daughter, despite her young age, knew more about him and how people operated than he would’ve thought.

And in the shower, where he had some time to relax with the warm water smoothly running down his body and the steam clearing his mind, so there he realized he hadn’t looked over at Peggy’s side in the bed this morning.

He sighed. No, he shouldn’t be dwelling on this. It was a good thing he was finally moving on. Peggy would want him to be happy too.

Stepping out of the shower, he patted himself with the blue towel ‒ which, now that he thought about it, kind of resembled Bucky’s _(James’)_ eye color (he stroked his crotch and thighs with it again) ‒ and put on a pair of black pants.

He targeted his room to put on a t-shirt as well when the bell rang, so he hurried to the door a little grumpily. Bucky _(James)_ was standing on the welcoming doormat wearing a rust-colored longsleeve, and apparently he shaved. Upon catching sight of Steve, he boldly looked him up and down. A cheeky half-smile came to his face.

“Don’t you think this is a little too obvious? Besides, it’s a cliché.”

“Good morning to you too,” nodded Steve and stepped away from the doorway. He’s been told a few times that he does and says cliché things. “I’d take your coat but, uhm. Aren’t you cold?”

The man shrugged while kicking off his shoes. “The metal isn’t.”

“But your other parts could be.”

(Your other beautiful parts.)

“Eh, I got used to it,” he waved before adding: “Russia.”

Steve opened his mouth to ask about it but Sarah downright raided the man at that point, yelling “Buckyyy!” as a battle-cry, and Steve realized he was still awkwardly half-naked, so he disappeared into his room to grab a t-shirt.

When he got back, the sight before him made his lips curve into a smile and his heart fill with warmth. And vice versa. James was sitting on the floor where he left him, and was listening carefully to what Sarah, sitting in his lap and snuggling to his chest, was explaining.

Steve was simply observing for a while, then he approached them and squatted. The man looked up at him; and he forgot just about everything and sacrificed himself to his eyes completely.

Bucky _(James)_ realized he should probably get up from the floor, so he did, by which Steve snapped back to reality. He asked: “Did you eat breakfast?”

“Yup.”

“But you’ll eat with us?” Sarah looked up at him with big eyes.

“Only because you’re asking so nicely…”

In the kitchen Steve interviewed everyone present about their food preferences then got to making it. James _(‒ Bucky)_ offered his help which Steve refused, so he and Sarah sat at the table.

After a while the girl put on some music.

“Sarah,” called Steve, “I’m not sure Bucky would like to listen to this.”

“Tangled? Are you kidding?” He laughed upon the realization that the song is _I’ve Got a Dream._ “Anytime.”

“You like Tangled?” The little girl was beaming with awe. “But there will be other songs… This is a Disney playlist.”

“Even better! What’s your favorite movie?”

“Moana! All my friends are crazy about Frozen. It’s not bad but I like Moana more. But I love Merida too. What’s your favorite?”

“Oh, I like the older ones more. Have you seen Mulan?”

“Of course! Daddy loves that one the most. You know because she is protecting her country too. I like it because of Mushu.”

The man got up and walked to Steve. “ _Daddy_ has a good taste then.” He leaned in close to him and whispered: “By the way, I like how _Bucky_ sounds from you. You should keep it. It’s kinda growing on me.”

With a wink he pushed himself from the marble counter he had been leaning on, and sat back next to Sarah.

Steve’s heart was pounding heavily. _Bucky._ It definitely suited him. Who would have thought that there was a soft soul hiding underneath the tough exterior? The feeling hit him again: like he had known this man for a long time.

“I haven’t seen Moana yet though,” he told Sarah. “But I like Merida.”

“Uuu! How long are you staying? We could watch it tonight.”

“If everything goes fine, yeah, we could.”

When Steve glanced there, he found himself against Bucky’s blue eyes. Not only his mouth but his eyes, his face, his whole being was smiling; he seemed free, and it looked as if he hadn’t experienced this feeling in a long time.

He also smiled and nodded. So far, it definitely seemed like everything was going fine.

He placed the pan on the table and stocked a few plates on it too, and Bucky put one in front of each of them with loud clanking. The same happened with the utensils.

Steve sat down too, and after a “bon appétit,” they started eating.

Once everyone was full, Steve carefully stocked the dishes in the sink and would have started washing them when the excited voice of Sarah…

“Oooh, come, I’ll show you my room!”

…interrupted him.

“Oh my bad, I haven’t even given you the tour,” he said, and hurried forward.

He opened all the doors, bathroom, closet, study; the bedroom was the first where Bucky actually stepped in. He walked around slowly, stopped at some points, and when he reached the photos hanging on the wall, Steve nervously bit his lower lip. But Bucky just smiled gently.

Maneuvering around Steve, he made a comment: “Beautiful.”

Steve stood in the doorway, rooted. _And you didn’t even know her best traits._

Tinkling laughter snaked to him from the end of the hallway. Sarah, it seemed, had gone on with the tour, and now they were playing something with Bucky in her room.

Steve decided this was the perfect opportunity for him to wash the dishes.

It was his explicit request for anyone watching her daughter, and of course he paid attention to this too, that Sarah had to be outside every day for a few hours at least. He was explaining this to Bucky as they were walking towards the park nearby that afternoon. Sarah was holding onto Bucky’s metal hand with Steve on the other side.

Stepping into the park, Sarah pressed a kiss on her father’s cheek (and, after a little consideration, on Bucky’s too), and ran to the playground where she made three playmates right away.

The two men sat down on a closeby bench underneath a rustling willow tree. Wrapping himself more into his warm pullover, Steve admired the cold-bearing skill of the man in only a t-shirt next to him.

“Popular kid,” Bucky stated.

Steve tore his gaze from the man’s bicep and glanced at the playground instead.

“You know, she’s actually good for me. And you too. Somehow I feel like we’ve known each other for a hundred years. As if we were old friends, you and I.” He stopped abruptly. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you or something.”

In surprise, Steve was examining the profile of the man who was examining the ground. “On the contrary.”

“I’m usually quiet. When I talk, it’s not much. I used to be completely different, but… you know, you grow up. It turned out like this for me. And I don’t know what’s up with me around you, but I talk to you. Like right now. Or in your office. I wouldn’t tell these things to anyone else. I don’t.”

Steve squeezed his shoulder. “I’ll gladly listen to you any time, Buck.”

He raised his head, looking at Steve with a weak replica of a smile, and he remained so for a while, then glanced in the direction of the children laughing and chatting on the playground.

“And Sarah‒ I told you, I’m not good with kids, I’m really not. I just can’t do anything with them. But she’s different somehow, it just… works. Maybe she’s the reason I can talk to you too. I mean she might be a gate for me‒ this sounds stupid, but do you get what I’m trying to say?”

“I’m glad we’re helping you. It seems, correct me if I’m wrong, like you’ve been through a lot that you should be able to talk to someone about.”

Bucky hemmed. “This might be a good start.”

“You don’t‒ There’s nobody else you are talking to?”

The man smiled with furrowed brows and sad eyes. He tilted his head ever-so-slightly, signaling a no.

“Whatever. It is what it is.”

“Have you ever thought about visiting a therapist?”

Bucky nudged his side. “Gee, thanks, Steve! I was trying so hard to cover my insanity…”

“Please tell me you’re not really this bigot.”

“‘Twas a joke, calm down. Ehm. I was seeing a shrink for a while but I didn’t feel any changes so I stopped going.”

“Well, it’s not a quick process. But really, if you feel like talking, I’m here. As an old friend you’ve just reunited with.”

“Isn’t the burden of saving the country enough?”

“With this, I have selfish intentions.”

The cheeky half-smile from this morning reappeared on Bucky’s face. “Oh really? What kind?”

“If you’re staying for the movie you promised to Sarah, maybe you’ll see.”

“Only because you’re asking so nicely…”

“What movie do we have to watch?”

“Moana. And we don’t _have to,_ you’ll enjoy it.”

“I have to say, I wouldn’t have pegged you for the Disney-type of guy.”

“Oh, I’ve got many traits you wouldn’t even think of.”

“Can’t wait to discover.”

“So you’re planning for the long term, huh?”

“Well, Sarah can’t stay alone at home for at least a few years‒”

“And you’ve got so much money anyways…”

“Ah, so that’s what this is about. You just need someone’s money.”

“You’re seeing through me so well.”

“Perfectly.”

At this point, Sarah stepped in front of them with another girl and a woman.

“Daddy, can Carmen come over tomorrow?”

“Hello,” the woman extended her hand. “I’m Carmen’s mom, Dolores.”

Dolores and Steve switched numbers so they could arrange the next day.

They made popcorn for the movie and drank fibrous juice.

Steve helped Sarah change into her pajamas then sat cross-legged in the left corner of the American-red couch, so Bucky placed himself in the right one, and the host politely offered a blanket to him. Although there was plenty of space between the two men, Sarah dropped down on the ground in front of the couch. During the movie, she often made comments on some lines and laughed loudly on the jokes, her ponytails swinging back and forth.

Bucky’s leg slid forward and tangled into the other man’s after a while. Every single time Steve shifted even just a little, Bucky was ready to pull his leg away, but Steve blocked the movement and caressed his shin, so he, relaxed, sank his leg back into the warmth of Steve.

Towards the end of the movie, they quickly pulled their legs up because Sarah started to climb up to the couch. She put her back to Bucky’s knee and piled her feet in her dad’s lap. She was breathing sleepfully by the credits.

Carefully, Steve removed the kid’s paws from his lap, turned off the tv, and collected the glasses and bowls. Meanwhile, Bucky freed his arms, grabbed Sarah and carried her to her bed, tucked her in gently, then pulled the door askew behind himself.

Going out to the kitchen, he cleared his throat. Steve was standing with his (oh wow so muscular) back to him, washing the dishes. Obviously.

“So, I guess I should go now. It was nice being here.”

Steve closed the tap and turned around. Wrapping his hand in an already wet dish cloth, then dropping it back to its place, he neared Bucky.

“Look, I‒” he sighed. “This might be weird but it’s difficult to let things of this nature flow on their own, spontaneously, so I’ll just say it straightforward, and hope that it’s gonna be okay. So. After a whole day of shameless flirting, would you like to spend the night here?”

A cocky grin sneaked to Bucky’s face. “I was hoping you’d ask.”

“Oh so you were expecting me to be the brave one?”

“Well, it’s your house, I can’t invite myself.”

“You’ve already invited yourself.”

“That’s different… That’s _professional._ I was applying for a job.”

Steve stepped closer and snaked his fingers under Bucky’s chin. In a voice he intended to come off as sexy, but it surely was deeper and quieter, he asked: “Did you like your first day?”

Bucky was staring at the full lips in front of him.

“How did I do on my first day?”

“Let’s find out.”


	4. “the havoc of war and the battle’s confusion”

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's just one thing to say.  
> Dolores.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Magyarul: [{ egy megoldás volt csak 4. }](https://andweweremadlyinlove.blogspot.com/2021/02/egy-megoldas-volt-csak-4.html)

The sun didn’t show that morning, rain was knocking on the window instead.

Slowly exiting the realm of dreams, Steve became aware of the material world around himself with satisfaction: the feeling of the warm, crispy blanket clinging to his back, of his body sinking into the expensive mattress and his head into the thick pillow; he took a deep breath of the fresh, rain-smelling air, and ‒ hearing the quiet breathing from behind him, last night’s experiences, those idyllic pictures, sneaked back into his mind. He smiled.

He rolled onto his other side where he found himself across an awake, happy-looking Bucky.

“Good morning,” he said, still almost in slumber. He shut his eyes and ran his arms around Bucky’s waist under the warm blanket. Gently gripping the skin, his thumb started wandering around, searching for the scar he had discovered yesterday.

“Good morning,” Bucky whispered and wiggled closer. “Sleepyhead.”

“Early riser,” Steve mumbled.

“Eh, not-sleeper, really. But I’m useful though, I brew coffee, it’s not cold yet. And I made breakfast.”

Satisfied, Steve hugged the man tighter. Their naked bodies, like puzzle pieces, fit together perfectly.

“I’m keeping you.”

“I want a raise for that.”

“I’m not even paying you yet.”

“Even more so.”

Steve laughed and pressed a kiss under Bucky’s ear. Then he left his head there lazily, snuggling it into Bucky’s neck, and wasn’t planning on moving it. Ever again.

“Stevie?”

“Hm?”

“I can’t breathe.”

“Hm,” Steve grunted, not moving, but then he pushed himself on one elbow. “These problems of yours…”

Bucky rolled onto his back. “Lemme know when you’re ready for breakfast.”

Steve rolled onto Bucky. “Depends on you.” His head disappeared under the blanket.

Bucky moaned discreetly as the hot mouth took him in, and his metal fingers carelessly stroked the blonde locks. Not much later, after a warning sigh _(Steve…),_ the wave of pleasure washed over his whole body, and with his head arched back, he repressed a joyful cry that would’ve been too loud.

Steve’s head popped out from under the covers, and with a smug look, he very visibly gulped. Glowing of pleasure and awe, Bucky pulled the man up to him and kissed him passionately, trying to give everything into the kiss he couldn’t form into words, and he felt like Steve knew, Steve understood, he felt like he was home, finally, with him, like he found his way back home, and he felt,

“Thank you.”

“You’re very welcome.”

“Do you want me to‒?”

Steve smiled kindly. “Let’s go eat.”

“Are you sure?”

“I’m sure. According to my plans, you’ll have plenty of chances to prove your skills,” Steve winked and climbed out of bed.

Bucky stayed in for a little longer because for one, he had to gain enough energy to get up ‒ as in, you know, to his feet ‒, and two, from here he had the perfect opportunity to stare at Steve’s shapely ass up until the point when Steve’s shapely ass left the room.

When he joined Steve in the kitchen in Steve’s t-shirt and Steve’s smell, Steve was already setting the table while humming to the song coming quietly from the radio. Upon catching sight of Bucky, he spun in front of him and extended his hand.

“May I get this dance?”

Bucky laughed in disbelief and gave in on a carpe diem basis. With Steve’s lead and with utter abandon, they displayed some kind of a disgraceful replica of the swing dance to the swing beats.

The song ended, and Bucky, being aware of the child somewhere in the house, breathed into Steve’s ear: “This was awfully gay.”

Steve grunted. “ _This_ was gay? Not what I did earlier in the room?”

“I didn’t say such a thing,” Bucky grinned. “But _this…_ this was gay on a whole another level.”

Steve snaked his hand around the man’s waist.

“I’ll make an effort to put a lot of your kind of fun into my time schedule too.”

“Great,” Bucky mumbled, getting lost in staring at Steve’s lips. He wanted to kiss them red. It’s been a long time since he last felt the rash of this kind of high.

And as if Steve felt his thoughts, he stroked the man’s freshly washed hair, and his whole face glowed sincerely, and Bucky couldn’t believe his luck, he couldn’t believe he met this wonderful man.

On a completely other note, Bucky stumbled upon the realization that he was in love. After two meetings. But two _intensive_ meetings, so this was absolutely okay, he reassured himself. Absolutely okay.

Steve gifted a kiss to Bucky. “I’ll go check if Sarah is up yet. I hope she is… I hate to wake her.” With that, he slid away into the hallway.

After a little while he reappeared with Sarah on his shoulder.

Bucky laughed. “Aren’t you a bit too big for that?”

Sarah stroked her dad’s hair. “Daddy’s strong.”

Steve stuck out his tongue teasingly and flexed his muscles in his arms. Bucky grinned at him with a raised eyebrow.

Then Steve squatted so the girl could climb down from his shoulder, and sitting at the table they ate their late and a little dry breakfast. Bucky prepared a delicious smorgasbord: sliced baguette and little cubes of cheese, piled cucumber, carrot, salad and cold cuts on a plate, and made cocoa and coffee.

Steve and Sarah piled the delicacies on their plates from the rich selection, however Bucky just put butter on his bagel slices, and he dipped them in his mug before stuffing them into his mouth. When Steve pushed the vegetable plate towards him significantly, Bucky politely refused and told them about how his mother had made him love the bagel with butter and cocoa.

Enthusiastically, Sarah threw a bite prepared by Bucky into her mouth.

“Eww! This is… squishy.”

Bucky laughed shamelessly.

Then Sarah discovered that a part of the food melted into her drink, so she made Bucky trade their mugs.

After breakfast, Steve asked his daughter to tidy her room because she was expecting a guest today. Meanwhile he packed the plates into the sink, put away the leftovers, and cleaned the table. Bucky took the chance to help: he swept the floor but he was done in minutes, so he sat back down, disappointed.

Steve got to washing the dishes while swaying his hips to the beats coming from the radio. And, reconsidering his situation by this turn of events, Bucky wasn’t disappointed anymore to just sit behind him.

“Instead of watching my butt, please text Dolores from my phone about the time she wants to bring her daughter.”

“It’s not my fault it’s so temptingly round,” Bucky noted as he spread out on the table reaching for Steve’s phone.

He typed the message, then hummed when the answer came.

“Steve?”

“Hm?”

“Uhm, Dolores wrote: _I thought I’d stay for a while, the two of us could have a drink or something._ ”

Steve turned around and looked at Bucky nervously.

“What, am I interrupting? Should I go?”

“Nonono, you’re staying. I’m just… I’m not good at this. Turning down others. I don’t like hurting people. What should I reply?”

“Once upon a time, there was a lawyer who didn’t like hurting people.”

“I’m a polite lawyer, okay? Rare breed. I meant, in my personal life.”

“Uhm, I don’t want to put words in your mouth, or scare you or something, considering that we only just met, but you could say, for example, that, uhm, I exist.”

Steve stepped behind the man and put his arms around his shoulder. “I thought we have known each other for a century.”

The man blinked up at him with uncertainty. “Is this the time to have the talk about what this is?”

“That’s easy. I’d be honored to call you my boyfriend.”

Bucky’s heart skipped a beat. “Likewise.”

Steve squeezed him and smacked a kiss on Bucky’s mouth before returning to his one true love, the sink.

“Dolores?” asked Bucky.

“Steve,” Steve objected to it.

“Steve?”

“Bucky?”

“Dolores.”

“Oh, yeah. Uhm. _I’m sorry, Dolores, unfortunately my partner is here._ ”

Bucky flinched. “This is terrible.”

“Thanks.”

“That’s all you could come up with? Really? Sorry, Dolores, my partner is _unfortunately_ here _currently?_ You can do better than that.”

Steve cleared his throat.

“Ad 1.: I didn’t mean it like that.”

“I know. Aid-two?”

“Ad 2.: I’m rephrasing.” Steve could be sassy too if he wanted. “I’m sorry, Dolores, _fortunately_ I have a partner, _continuously,_ so I don’t have to talk to you.”

“Haha.”

“Okay, okay. Dear Dolores, I must decline your proposition‒”

“Steve, this is not a formal email, just a text message.”

“Occupational disease,” sighed Steve. “What would you write?”

“The guy is mine, hands off? Oooh: if you want Steve, you have to fight me. It even rhymes!”

“I guess Carmen won’t be able to make it today.”

“What?” shrieked Sarah.

Steve jumped. “How can you always appear so unexpectedly? I was just kidding, honey.”

“Daddy got asked out on a date by Carmen’s mom,” Bucky informed the girl. “And now he’s struggling to come up with a single appropriate answer.”

“That’s easy,” Sarah shrugged. “You’re sweet, Dolores, but I’ve got a boyfriend. You’re welcome here though.”

The two men stared at the girl in surprise.

Steve cleared his throat. “I didn’t even‒ how do you know that?”

Sarah stared back at his dad, puzzled. “It’s not hard to see you’re head over feet about each other.”

“Heels,” Bucky corrected her, mumbling.

“It could be your last hair, I don’t care,” Sarah waved her hand dismissively. “Daddy’s happy, Bucky’s nice and cool, so everyone wins. By the way, I made my room. Can Carmen come over please?”

Steve blinked and stared some more at his daughter, and tried to organize his thoughts.

“Uhm. Eh. Sure. Uhm, Bucky, could you please text Dolores that thing Sarah said?”

Bucky smiled at the girl proudly and opened up the SMS app again. Then he realized he’d forgotten the sentence.

“Sarah,” he said, “I forgot the sentence.”

The mother-daughter pairing arrived after lunch, and Steve invited them in heartily.

Sarah and Carmen disappeared into the girl’s room almost immediately, and Steve politely insisted that Dolores should stay for a coffee. She gave in, giggling; she pulled down her boots and dropped down her coat, under which she was wearing a tight, low-cut top that matched her wine-red lipstick. All these were things Steve tried not to notice.

She followed him to the kitchen where she stopped, rooted, upon catching sight of Bucky leaning on the counter.

“Hi,” he offered his human hand. “James Buchanan Barnes.”

“Oh, yes, I saw you in the park but we didn’t introduce ourselves. I’m Dolores,” she shook the hand in front of her, then her eyes wandered to the man’s left arm suspiciously. “I didn’t know it was you.”

Meanwhile Steve poured coffee in their mugs. “Dolores, how do you drink your coffee?”

“Milk, no sugar. Thanks.”

Steve wondered about Bucky’s preference for a while, but he realized he didn’t know, so he looked at the man questioningly.

“Black,” said Bucky.

A determined smile creeped up Dolores’ face, and she placed herself on one of the stools.

“I’m assuming, then, that you haven’t been, uhm, seeing each other for long?”

“Indeed, that’s right.” Steve stepped behind Bucky and put his hand on the man’s shoulder. “But it’s like we’ve known each other forever.”

“Except for how he drinks his coffee,” chuckled Dolores. Bucky didn’t like this woman at all. “Come on, I’m messing with you! How did you two meet?”

“At work,” Bucky said curtly.

Steve sat on a stool across Bucky.

“We got closer because of my daughter. But we met at work, yes.”

Dolores turned to Steve, giggling. “Ah, what on Earth are these little devils not good for… Say, what is it that you do?”

“I’m a lawyer.”

“Oh, how interesting! I used to be interested in law too, but I decided to work in marketing. I meet all kinds of people with that too,” she was chattering away. “Steve, dear, you must tell me about your job one day!” She touched his arm. “Oh, how fit you are… Even though you don’t have to defend your clients with muscle.”

Dolores laughed.

Steve laughed too, out of sheer politeness.

Bucky raised an eyebrow. He wasn’t impressed.

Steve smiled at him reassuringly, and by that, Dolores seemingly noticed the man was still present. She cleared her throat.

“Uhm, and James, how did you get that pretty arm?” She obviously asked about the only thing she was interested in about him.

“Someone crossed me,” Bucky muttered pointedly.

Dolores giggled nervously. “Ah, I see, you’re that tough guy who you don’t disagree with. I’m telling you,” she turned back to Steve, and, touching his arm again, she leaned in closer, as if she was about to share a big secret, “these kinda guys are just waiting to be tamed. They’ll be so agreeable after that, they’ll do anything for you.”

Steve smiled politely. “Definitely. I’m on it.”

“Good luck, dear. Let me know if you don’t succeed,” she winked, accompanying it with a giggle.

An eternity of chattering later, or at least that was what it felt like for Bucky, the woman finally spoke the magic words, aimed at Steve exclusively, of course:

“I should get going now, I won’t keep you up. Thank you for the coffee.”

With that, she got up and walked to the door, followed by Steve.

“It was nice meeting you,” Steve lied out of courtesy.

Dolores put her boots on and grabbed her coat.

“Yeah, you too. I’ll be back for Carmen at around five, take care of her, and feel free to call me if anything comes up.” She touched Steve’s shoulder, and, getting on her toes, she pressed her cheek to the man’s. “Bye, Steve.”

He waved before shutting the door behind her, and escaped back to the kitchen. Bucky wasn’t there. He found him in the living room, spread out on the couch.

“She is gone,” announced Steve.

“My brain too.” Bucky imitated his head exploding with his hands.

Steve decided this was as good time as any to play dogpile: he lay on Bucky who made a whimpering sound at the sudden weight on him.

“It wasn’t that bad…”

“It was.”

“Convincing argument.”

“And I’m right.”

“Yes.”

“She was literally flirting with you one foot away from me,” Bucky said in disbelief.

“Did you see how excited she was when I didn’t know how you drank your coffee? I think she thought that she still has a chance because we haven’t been dating for long.”

“Probably. I have a homophobic feeling about her too. Kinda like if she didn’t see this as a valid, real relationship. Or something.”

“It _is_ a fact that I have a child, from which it can be deduced that I have been with a woman, however this doesn’t undermine the reality of our relationship.”

“This occurrence is commonly referred to as ‘bisexual erasure’ in everyday language,” Bucky declaimed in Steve’s style.

As a response, Steve poked him in the ribs. Then, as a defense, he completed it with: “Occupational disease.” He cleared his throat. “Uhm. By the way, are you… only attracted to men?” Bucky huffed so Steve quickly added: “I mean, you don’t have to answer if you don’t want to.”

“Truth is that I don’t really know. There are all these labels now… I used to be attracted to all kinds of people. Then… Well, since a while I haven’t been looking at people like that. I think it’s still true that I’m attracted to anyone I like, and that’s it. But there are way less of those people now than there used to be.”

“There’s a label for that too, probably.”

“There’s a label for everything.”

Steve got himself up to a sitting position. Bucky followed his example as well.

“Can I ask something?” Steve asked.

“You just did,” Bucky answered.

“How did you get your arm?”

“I’m pretty sure it was there since I was born.”

“Jerk.” Steve poked him. “Your metal arm.”

Bucky sighed. “That’s a funny story, actually.”

“I’m sensing it’s not really.”

“I’m not famous for my humor.”

“For what then?”

“Sadly, for things that are way worse than my humor.”

Steve could have come up with a witty reply but, not wanting to drift from the subject, just waited quietly for the answer.

When Bucky finally spoke, he often stopped mid-speech, and he sounded like he was reading a text.

“I’m a veteran. I enlisted when I was young, it was my dream to be a soldier. I’ve seen nasty things during my years, not nice memories, but I’m not really shook. When I was discharged, I wanted to leave my soldier life behind, but I got into an accident. The doctors saved me from my arm which was totaled. They didn’t think I’d make it, I was a completely hopeless case. That’s when I met Zola. He was working in the hospital I was treated in. For some reason, my case piqued his interest, so he took over.”

Here he stopped for an even longer time, sinking into his thoughts, and Steve was at the point where he almost said something when the man continued.

“He made the arm, it was designed especially for me, and it’s his drugs that keep me alive,” he finished quickly, then looked up.

“Wow,” said Steve. Contrary to his gut feeling, he would have to think differently about Zola after this. He saved Bucky’s life. “So, basically, you’re working for him because you’re grateful?”

“Something like that. Khm. I see it as my duty.”

“Thank you for telling me,” said Steve. “This cleared some things up.”

Bucky was chewing on his lower lip, and hummed.

“Come here,” Steve breathed and opened his arms. Bucky fell into them. “You brave soldier.”


	5. “should leave us no more”

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Since I have no love life, here's the new chapter of the this story about love right before Valentine's Day :'))

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Magyarul: [{ egy megoldás volt csak 5. }](https://andweweremadlyinlove.blogspot.com/2021/02/egy-megoldas-volt-csak-5.html)

Steve hopped into the car next to Sarah Monday morning, humming joyfully.

“Good morning, Sam.”

“Someone’s terribly happy this gloomy morning…”

“Daddy’s in love!” Sarah announced enthusiastically. Steve, being the model father he was, glared at her angrily, but of course the girl wasn’t intimidated by that. “His name is Bucky, I mean at first only I called him that, then daddy too, because he’s actually James, and he’s the coolest guy ever! And he was here the whole weekend, it was so much fun, but he went home yesterday evening because he has work today too. But he’ll come back this afternoon.”

“To watch Sarah,” Steve added, slightly annoyed. He would’ve wanted to feed all this information to his friend at a slower pace. “He’s the new nanny.”

“Oh, yeah, because Shae is going back to college so she can’t come over anymore. But I hope we’ll meet sometimes…”

“I’ll talk to Sharon, okay? We’ll arrange something for you two.”

“So,” Sam concluded, “you’re dating the nanny.”

“Yeah.”

“I would find a plan B if I were you. I mean for the position. Or for being your partner.”

“I think we’ll be fine.”

Sam only hummed and mummed in a cultured manner as an answer.

At the school Steve, after saying goodbye to Sarah, politely stopped for some small talk with one of the teachers because Steve was like that, after all, then he climbed back into the car.

Sam immediately voiced his counterargument that was well-thought-out and fully formed by then.

“So you’ve got a boyfriend.”

“I do.”

“And Agent Carter was a woman.”

“Peggy. If I remember correctly, yes. Have you heard of bisexuality?”

“Yup. Not from you though.”

“Maybe I just haven’t told you yet.”

“Or you didn’t know either.”

“Or I didn’t know either.” Steve sighed in surrender. He was kicking a dented plastic bottle on the floor with his elegant shoe. “Look, when I met Bucky, I just knew, okay? He was standing there and we talked and everything was going great, and everything was so simple and easy, and I noticed how good he looked‒ Somehow the whole situation was just good, you know? And it has been good since then.”

“I do notice too that you look good, and we have good conversations. Still, I don’t want to have sex with you. Look, I’m just worried about you. Is this a stage of grief too?”

“No, this is completely real. Couldn’t be more real. I care about this person, he’s important to me, and I’m hoping for a long, happy future together. Can you please just accept that?”

Sam took a long look at him in the rearview mirror. He nodded because of Steve’s determination, but he wasn’t convinced.

“Come over for dinner sometime.”

“Definitely.”

Stepping into his office the first thing he caught sight of was three huge piles of paper. Right away, he stormed out to Maria.

“How did those papers get on my desk?”

“You had to read those for today.”

“You just expected me to know that my desk gave birth to a library over the weekend?”

“Peter spent almost his whole weekend here and worked. He said he sent you an email.”

Steve massaged the bridge of his nose nervously.

“Get him here,” he said finally, and marched back to his office where he put himself down to his comfortable chair.

He was through with roughly reading the documents of the first pile when Peter opened his door after a little knock.

“Good morning, Mr. Rogers.”

“Good morning, Peter. What are these?”

“These are the documents related to the case, and, additionally, my own conclusions and research, sir. I sent you an email.”

“I did not get an email, and we have to face Dr. Zola in about an hour. And I won’t even go there to ask why you spent your whole weekend here.”

Peter’s face went red. No, not only his face but his neck too, and in general, the entire kid.

“I‒ not the whole‒” Then he pulled out his phone. “But I‒ oh.”

“Oh?”

“I am so sorry, sir, I made a typo. A Ste-P-H-en Rogers got the message.”

Steve sighed.

“But I already know it by heart,” he added quickly. “I can explain it.”

The man waved approvingly.

“So the HYDRA company, as it is today, was founded two years ago by Dr. Zola‒”

“Wait, two years? It didn’t exist before that?”

“Before that, it was an illegal organization, but no one was able to prove anything.”

“Hm.”

Bucky had been in that hospital more than two years ago, presumably, which meant that, at that point, Zola had been part of that outlaw organization still. However hard he was trying to concentrate on Zola being a good person, he had to be, Steve couldn’t fight the feeling: something was not adding up here.

It didn’t cross his mind, didn’t even come near his mind that Bucky might have lied, he didn’t question his story at all.

About an hour later, Steve was caught up with all the documents and was ready for the meeting.

At exactly the time his appointment was for, Maria rang the office on the phone, saying that he arrived. Steve commented suggestively that there are _two_ of them, which she forgot to mention last time. Maria apologized along with a clipped _fuck,_ Steve snarled, and Maria decided to just quickly let the men in instead.

“Dr. Zola, welcome,” Steve shook hands with an all-concealing, subtle smile. This man made him feel uneasy.

He turned to Bucky who was staring at him with a completely straight face. Steve cleared his throat.

“Mr. Barnes, good morning.”

The man performed the handshake like a machine, automatically and wordlessly: one task, tick.

Steve led Zola to the table, wondering, then glanced back to Bucky for a quick moment. He was hoping that now that nobody was able to see, he might smile at him, or give any kind of indication that he had recognized him, but the man was just standing in the corner; straight, stiff, dark, grim ‒ like a machine that had been turned off, somehow he wasn’t _humanlike._

Steve banished the thought from his mind. Silly. He sat down, and started to present the facts.

After Zola and Bucky left, Steve was wondering about the man’s behaviour. Did _he_ say something wrong? Maybe he shouldn’t have asked him about his arm and past yesterday? Or did something happen since then? Maybe Bucky had realized the weekend was ‒ _godforbid_ ‒ a mistake, and now he will be getting ‒ _pleaseno_ ‒ a text as well, saying it was over ‒ _don’tgo, don’tleave_ ‒, plus he won’t be able to watch Sarah anymore? ‒ _I beg you…_ ‒

Steve’s stomach was clenched for the rest of the day.

Around six in the evening, his brain being officially overwhelmed, he closed the last folder too. He grabbed his weary but still stylish (yes, stylish, thank you very much) bag, took the elevator, and stepped out of the building.

In that moment, a woman in black clothes and with fiery red hair turned up in front of him.

“Mr. Rogers?”

“And you are?”

“Natasha Romanoff. Media. You’re working on the HYDRA case if I’m correct?”

“You’re correct.”

The woman pulled out her phone, tapped it, and held up the device. “Mr. Rogers, I looked into your career a little bit. I must say, I envy your morals. You don’t care about money, own self-interest, you only take on cases based on your values. Would you agree with me when I say the HYDRA case doesn’t seem to fit into this image?”

“Our limitations must be tested from time to time, Miss Romanoff.”

“What is your opinion about the police not starting a new investigation into Dr. Zola and his company again after the unsuccessful attempts in the past?”

“You just answered your question. Because the past ones had been unsuccessful, obviously reasonably so.”

“What would you like to say to the infuriated patients, among whom are many who are dying because of the so-called medicines of Dr. Zola?”

“We can not make assumptions at this point, therefore I would like to skip this without comment.”

“Based on my research, there is clear evidence pointing to the cause of numerous deaths, which is none other than these particular medications.”

“You know I can’t tell you anything that goes against my client. And I’m better at my job than to let something slip out accidentally. What is this about?”

“I am too, in mine,” she stated. After a short pause she sighed and put her phone back into her pocket. “Look, I know that the bodyguard of Zola is the one James Barnes. Have you met him?”

“Yes,” Steve admitted, and he couldn’t fight down the corner of his lips as he thought back to the weekend. Yes, he has met him.

“Oh,” realized the woman.

“Sorry?”

“Your face.” The manicured fingers waved in the direction of his face. “You two are close.”

“Sort of. Why do you care?”

She clicked her tongue. “Steve‒ may I?” He nodded. “Steve, be careful with that man. You know, between the two of us, I’m not sure James is the kind of person you can save.”

“Excuse me?”

“You don’t know him, not even remotely. How much has he told you?”

“I’m not gonna lay out his past to a stranger.”

“I’m not a stranger,” said Natasha. “We were dating.”

“Oh. In that case, let me buy you a coffee, what do you think?”

“Hey, I’ll have an americano, and she…”

“A cappuccino. Thanks.”

Sitting in the cafe on the corner, Steve sent a few words to Sam about needing his services only a little bit later, then turned to the woman across him.

“So, Natasha,” Steve started, “tell me. How did you meet?”

“My accent is not heavy at all now, I guess, but my name might have given me away. Before I moved here, I was living in Russia. But all that is not relevant. What _is_ relevant is that James used to be a legend when I was young. Nobody was sure he existed, nobody ever saw him, but everyone knew of him. A ghost story. Has he told you about his career as a soldier?”

The waitress placed their coffees in front of them. When she left, Steve nodded, and put some sugar into his cup.

“Well, yes, he used to be a soldier here in the normal way. But in Russia everyone knew him as the Winter Soldier. Zola’s mad idea, these stupid drugs, took their toll. James wasn’t himself. The point is that I don’t know what he’s been like since then, what he’s like now, but be careful. His brain had been washed pretty well, for many years, and I don’t think something of this kind can just simply fade.”

A group of question marks filled Steve’s head. “I think I don’t follow. What did he do that made you feel like this about him?”

“Again, I don’t know what he’s like now, and believe me, I’d love to know him because I truly care about him, but if Zola’s creations stayed in him, it’s better for you to be cautious.”

Natasha took a gulp from her coffee, and Steve waited for the continuation impatiently.

“I used to be around these kinds of people, that’s how our paths crossed with James, and I think I could help him which I’m happy about, but he definitely didn’t help me. Which is my fault, to be honest. James… as I said, wasn’t himself, he was full of this shit Zola stuffed in him before sending him off to Russia. I think he didn’t even know of himself, let alone others. They turned him into a mindless machine, really, who was just following orders. During our more peaceful meetings I tried to untangle and make the effects of the brainwashing disappear, and maybe I did succeed a little bit at least, but still…”

She looked up significantly.

“Steve, James killed people. Many. Innocent one, less innocent ones, even outright evil ones, women, men, every kind, without a second thought, anyone Zola and his team ordered him to. HYDRA was an illegal organization doing this. Many projects similar to the Winter Soldier were done. Steve, I was hoping I could trust you. You can’t trust these people. You can’t help them.”


	6. “their blood has washed out their foul footsteps’ pollution”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Magyarul: { [Egy megoldás volt csak 6.](https://andweweremadlyinlove.blogspot.com/2021/02/egy-megoldas-volt-csak-6.html) }

_‒ James!_

_‒ Natalia?!_

Steve rushed to the car and jumped to the backseat. Natasha, naturally, followed him. She accidentally shut the door with too much strength, only to ease the tension in the air.

They were all silent the whole ride, except for Natasha introducing herself to Sam (who decided not to ask questions, considering the tension in the air which, obviously, wasn’t eased).

Arriving at the house Steve popped out nervously, of course only after letting her get out first.

To avoid any confusion, Steve wasn’t doubting Bucky. The weekend he spent with him was marvellous, and he saw what kind of man he is. He strongly believed that he was a decent and respectful person. He felt like he saw a layer of him nobody else did, maybe the Bucky he was before all this awfulness. He wasn’t doubting him. He just wanted to talk about this, clear the situation, find out if he can really trust this man with his daughter.

And he wanted to unveil the real Zola.

Steve clenched the doorknob, let Natasha in, and rushed to the living room.

“Bucky!”

“In her room,” came the answer.

Steve, looking at Natasha, waved in the direction of the kitchen, and he navigated to the mentioned room.

“Hey Sarah.” Squatting down, he hugged his daughter. “Look, I need to talk to Bucky about something now. Can you please stay here?”

Sarah blinked up at her dad in confusion, but, seeing his concern, she just nodded silently.

“Thank you.”

He straightened himself and looked over to Bucky who was wearing a pink tiara. He _couldn’t possibly_ doubt him.

“Could you please come out to the kitchen?”

Bucky got to his feet anxiously, and followed Steve, however, upon seeing the fiery red haired woman, he stopped in the doorway, rooted.

‒ James!

‒ Natalia?!

Silence creeped into the room and planted itself for a while. These two were staring at each other ‒ she in a gentle but distant way, he nervously and firmly.

And Steve was staring at them. Just in a general way.

Finally Bucky broke the silence. “Наталья, я… я виновата. Прости меня. Я…”

“У тебя тиара,” Natasha pointed out. Bucky, disrupted, reached for the tiara on his head, and took it off.

With a huge smile on her face, she crossed the room, and hugged the man. “Джеймс, давненько не виделись.” She pressed her face to his chest, holding the body that went through so much tightly with her arms, a piece of her past, and she didn’t ever want to let him go, she didn’t want to let him go…

Then she let him go, took a few steps back, and looked at Steve.

“We ran into each other with Steve, and you came up. And now Steve is confused.”

Steve blinked at the mysterious, wounded man in confusion.

“I can see that,” he said, then he asked softly: “What are you confused about?”

Steve didn’t know where to start.

And then it hit Bucky with the strength of a tidal wave; he looked over to her with dread written all over his face.

“What did you tell him?” His voice sizzled with a steely edge.

“The truth,” she said. “About Russia. About the Winter Soldier.”

He bit his lower lip, closed his eyes, and he was angry and scared, and started counting down from ten to calm down. Ten, nine… This is how it ends. This is where it goes haywire. _(eight, seven…)_ He thought he could still enjoy a few weeks, _(six, five…),_ maybe even months with this great man and his amazing daughter, _(deep inhale, four…)_ but the moment arrived sooner than he expected. _(exhale, three, two…)_ The moment that’s going to ruin everything between them. One.

During these quick seconds Steve was examining his face. Even if he hadn’t thought so this far, now, because of the intensity of the genuine feelings he saw on that weary but unbreakably kind face, he was convinced of his Bucky being a good man. The kind you _have to_ save.

“Bucky,” Steve spoke softly and stepped closer to him, “I would just like to hear the full story. Can we talk about this now? Please?”

Bucky was eyeing Steve for a moment and saw‒ he found fear at the bottom of Steve’s eyes, and rejection, and the judgement to be made about him. He shook his head nervously and targeted the door.

“I can’t‒ not now. Я не могу этого сделать. I’m sorry.”

And Bucky was already out the door which he swung closed behind himself.

Steve stared after him with a frown. Then he felt a warm hand on his shoulder.

“I’ll go after him,” Natasha said. “I’ll talk sense into that stupid head of his.”

He nodded meekly, and she was gone. Steve watched her long coat floating behind her in the air as she was jogging after the man.

Turning around, he found himself across Sarah’s questioning eyes.

“Someone shut the door loudly,” she explained. “Are you okay, daddy?”

Steve went closer and, squatting, hugged the little girl.

“Everything’s all right, honey. I just found out some things about Bucky he’s not happy about. Did you two have a good day?”

Steve, being truly interested, listened to the torrent of words, during which he confirmed himself with satisfaction that he, in fact, did not leave his only child in the care of a criminal.

Then the sound of a few determined knocks interrupted Sarah’s rambling.

“Seems like drama is about to continue,” Steve sighed. Turning to the kid, he asked her in the calmest tone possible: “Honey, can you please go back to your room?”

“Okay but tell me when Bucky’s leaving! I want to say bye,” she said with big eyes.

“Sure, I will let you know.”

Steve targeted the door, on the other side of which there was not only Natasha but, to his utter delight, Bucky too, although his eyes were fixed on the ground.

Putting on a soothing and trustworthy smile, he said: “I suggest we move to the living room.”

Steve sat in the left corner of the couch, his usual spot, so Bucky placed himself on the right side, and Natasha chose the armchair across them. The air was heavy with tension, and the only sound was the breathing of the three of them. And the sharp ticking of the clock on the wall.

Natasha began to giggle quietly, and the two men glared at her questioningly.

“Sorry, I have this urge to laugh every time there’s tension. Sorry.”

“Ehm.” Bucky cleared his throat. “I guess I’ve got to get started.”

Steve placed his hand softly on Bucky’s knee. “Only if you’re ready.”

Bucky glanced up at him with a broken half-smile. He couldn’t believe he was this supportive. (He won’t be when he hears the whole story.)

He took a deep breath and began.

“Up to the accident, it really happened as I told you. And then I left out the bad part. So I was in the hospital with eight types of painkillers in me, and who knows what kind of sedatives, with only half the number of arms than I was supposed to have, several internal bleeding, broken bones, so you know, things like that. I was a wreck. An unrecoverable wreck. But at least I was never awake enough to fully comprehend that fact. Then, at one point, Zola visited me. Might I add, I’m saying all these things, but I didn’t remember any of it for a long time. It was like, and some parts are still like they didn’t happen. Blackout. Please take this into consideration, Steve. I put the pieces together only later, with the help and research of Nat.

Steve nodded understandingly. Natasha nodded encouragingly.

“So, I’m not sure what happened exactly, but judging by the evidence, Zola somehow started to run experiments on me,” he continued. “The hospital was extremely overwhelmed, the nurses overworked and underpaid even back then, and I was getting several different treatments. I guess nobody noticed Zola adding a few. His drugs helped at first, for just enough time for me to be let out from the hospital. After this he called me, sounding all overjoyed and everything about being able to help me recover, and I was, of course, truly grateful. He invited me over, saying he wanted to collect data about my symptoms and side effects I’m experiencing to be able to perfect his medicines. When I got there, my gut warned me that it looked bad ‒ it was some crappy, worn-down, abandoned factory-looking place on the far-end part of the city. Then, naturally, it didn’t go well. They tied me to a table, HYDRA, as I realized afterwards, and continued where they left off. From here, it’s a complete blackness, and I can only rely on Nat’s findings.”

Bucky glanced over to her with uncertainty.

Natasha clenched the arms of the chair and leaned forward. Her hair bounced forward too, covering half of her face.

“In a nutshell, it seems like HYDRA had already conducted a few experiments on humans by then. But this was the biggest one. The Winter Soldier project. They turned James into a machine, basically, that only followed their orders, and besides that, they had been washing his brain all the time to guarantee he wouldn’t rebel. The organization had allies in Russia, that’s why James was sent there for a couple of years where, of course, dear, dear Россия, what else would you expect from that country, he got handed over to even rougher and harsher people. At first he was only let out for test-runs, aimed at easy targets, then, when they saw the _machine_ they had created worked, he got assigned jobs more frequently and of more difficulty. The Winter Soldier soon became their strongest asset. And he was going on killing sprees a lot on the orders of those people, without ever talking back. And his footprints were carefully erased by HYDRA.”

Bucky was listening with his eyes fixed on the floor.

Steve squeezed his knee, and asked Natasha: “And how did you get into this whole thing?”

“I… was a member of a cult since I was born. I didn’t know it was a cult though. But, you know, it was the kind of cult that was especially damaging. That was where I met James, and he was the reason I realized that the things I had experienced so far, the things he had experienced so far, those were not okay. When James was brought back home here, to the US, I secretly joined him. Then he vanished, and believe me, I’m really good in my field of work, but even I couldn’t find him. Well, up until now.”

“If the weapon was working so well, why did they bring it back to the US?” Steve pronounced the words with disgust. His gut proved to be right, Zola was a person to be stopped, but he wasn’t expecting to find out just how cruel and inhumane things he is capable of.

“About two years ago… three?… the Зимний Солдат project started to raise too much attention, so they had to cancel it. I suspect they still think it’s only temporary.”

Natasha glanced worriedly at the subject of the conversion who was fidgeting with the tassels of the blanket next to him.

“James, I’m here to help you, okay? I want to help you get out of this. They can’t send you back.”

“To Russia or to that state?” Bucky pointed the question to her sharply and hoarsely.

Natasha gritted her teeth and leaned back with her arms crossed.

“They can do both, and I can’t say anything about it,” he said crossly. “If I don’t obey, it takes two pushes of a button for them to put everything on the internet because that exists now, that’s how easy it is to destroy a man now. They’ve got recordings of everything. Well, of everything that reflects negatively on _me,_ that is.”

“That’s why you’re working for him. Because you don’t have a choice,” Steve concluded. “Do you still get brainwashed and drugged?”

“Just the drugs, and a relatively small amount. I am aware of myself and I am in the present, I don’t feel like they’re actually doing anything to me. I guess I’m just getting them because they want to make sure they can get the Soldier back out any time.”

Steve shook his head angrily.

“How do they have the audacity‒ Okay, Natasha is right. We’ll fight them, HYDRA, Zola, everyone. Together.

In the following hours they were occupied with researching on the internet and examining the clues they came across.

At some point Steve called Peter for a piece of information who insisted on coming over. (“You want to leave me out of a job so big? Are you kidding, Mr. Rogers?” ‒ In response to which Mr. Rogers asked what’s the reason for him not having a life.) He arrived with paper boxes and folders. Natasha, Bucky and Steve walked out to the car, the introductions happened, and then Peter politely stocked the boxes on each one of them, all of which they miraculously managed to get inside in one go.

So now there were the four of them hunching over books, laptops and documents.

Around dinner time Steve ordered Chinese, and when it arrived, they assembled in the kitchen. Steve called for Sarah too who shook hands with everyone happily, then they sat down.

A great atmosphere developed while they were eating, filling the room with light chattering, and Sarah found a new friend in Natasha. Steve looked around his company with satisfaction: strange team indeed, but every single one of them has become dear to him.

After they finished with their meals, Steve picked up Sarah, got her into her pajamas in her room, and sent her off to wash her teeth. Meanwhile he produced the next comic book in line, and cozied himself next to the little bed.

Sarah, returning to the room, got into bed obediently, and Steve placed the comic in front her. They started reading it together, although the story was interrupted many times because Sarah kept talking about her first day spent with Bucky.

When she finally fell asleep, Steve turned off the lights, and quietly stumbled out of the room (he managed to avoid getting his toe stubbed into the toy box next the door as he usually did), heading back to the kitchen. Muffled voices were coming from behind the closed door of the living room.

Standing in the doorway he realized the kitchen was spotless, the table had been wiped, the leftovers had been put away. In the absence of anything else to clean, he got to wash the few plates lying in the sink.

“How dutiful,” Bucky, leaning to the doorjamb, shook his head.

Steve smiled and stepped closer. “Hey, is everything okay?”

Bucky chuckled in disbelief. “Really, _you_ are the one asking that? Steve, is everything okay with _you_? I know it must’ve been too much all at once, and deterrent‒”

Steve hushed him with a smile and snaked his arms around his waist.

“I’m not going anywhere. I’m staying with you ‘till the end of the line. At least that’s my plan.”

He leaned in and slowly kissed the shocked and melting Bucky.

“Now come.” He grabbed the hand of his boyfriend. “We’ve got a lot to do.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please feel free to correct my Russian:)   
> And actually the whole thing is unbeta'd so that's also something you can do if you feel like it.


	7. “between their loved homes and the war’s desolation”

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> i'm sorry i'm sorry i'm sorry i'm here i'm here chapter's here everything's fine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Magyarul: { [Egy megoldás volt csak 7.](https://andweweremadlyinlove.blogspot.com/2021/03/egy-megoldas-volt-csak-7.html) }

Steve convinced Tony. It was a tough fight, long and hard work, but finally Tony let Steve throw the HYDRA files to the trash. (Steve couldn’t help himself, he literally did that.)

The determination of his was a big reason, but besides that, the boss also saw this was about something more personal. And because he couldn’t tolerate shallowness, he asked.

“Why is this so important to you?”

And Steve realized this was one of the many situations when honesty was the best solution. In fact, he was going to be  _ completely  _ honest.

“My boyfriend is involved in Zola’s program.”

Wrinkles formed on Tony’s forehead. “Okay, first of all, I didn’t know you  _ have  _ a boyfriend. Secondly,  _ boyfriend? _ Thirdly, that he’s involved. This puts the whole thing into a different light. You know you can’t be connected to the case like that.

“Yeah, this happened while‒ never mind, not important. What’s important is that Zola is really a terrible person who has done terrible things. We’d be glad to know we can count on you against HYDRA, Tony.

“I’m intrigued.” He sat on the edge of this desk. “Explain.”

And Steve did so.

He didn’t want to betray Bucky’s trust, after all the man had just opened up ‒ or rather, had been forced to open up ‒ but they needed every hand on deck and every ally in line while working on this complex case, and he thought Bucky would understand it. Plus he needed someone on his side in the legal way too, and he couldn’t find anyone better than Tony if he wanted to.

Tony listened to his monologue without saying a word, then at the end he spilled out the solution in a natural, matter-of-fact way.

“Barnes is our live evidence.”

Steve thought about it for a second, and asked worriedly: “Can you make it so that‒ I mean he’s a good guy. Zola is the bad one here.”

“I don’t know, I’ll have to talk to him first,” Tony said. “But if there’s anything that can get him out of a sentence or lighten it, you know goddamn well I can make it happen. Can we call him in now?”

“He’s with Zola.” Steve’s entire body tensed upon the statement.

Tony stepped closer and squeezed his shoulder. “The case is in my hands now. Everything’s gonna be fine.”

He blinked at his boss with gratitude.

“Okay then the woman you mentioned? Natasha? Can she come in now?”

“I’ll ask.”

“Get the files over here while you’re on that, thanks,” Tony said as he placed himself back into his chair, and he was already buried deep in work on his laptop.

Steve shot a smile at Pepper passing by (was that a new bracelet?) while holding his phone to his ear. As it turned out, Natasha was actually nearby.

Then he and Peter lugged all the files into Tony’s office.

When he entered, Tony eyed Peter for a few minutes, seemingly confused. Turning to Steve, he said: “I thought you have a daughter. And she’s in her first years in school.”

“He’s Peter, the intern you assigned to me. I thought you’ve met.”

“I don’t handle these things. And I specifically said we don’t hire students younger than a graduate.”

“Uhm, no, sir,” Peter stuttered, “I had actually graduated. Already. From Harvard. I’ve read a lot about you and your father, sir, it’s an honour meeting you.” He extended his hand.

Tony continued to eye the boy, now doubtfully, then his hand, then Steve, then the boy again. Finally he shook the hand.

“Mr. Stark,” Pepper knocked on the door. “Someone called Natasha Romanoff is here. She states a meeting has been set up…?”

“Oh yes,” Tony cleared his throat. “Yes, let her in.”

Natasha swayed into the office as if she was weightless.

She glided to Steve. “Hello,” she quickly hugged him, then offered her hand to the other two.

After Tony questioned Natasha about every detail regarding HYDRA and the Winter Soldier project, all of which Steve had told him in broad strokes, and made her sign some papers, he voiced the big question with his interlaced fingers in front of him.

“So when is Barnes free?”

“He watches my daughter after Zola. I was hoping I could be here for him at the meeting… but if I go home to Sarah, he can come here.”

Natasha was putting on her thin coat.

“I can watch Sarah if you want,” she offered. “I think we kinda liked each other yesterday.”

“Really? You’re great! Thank you, Natasha.” Steve smiled at her thankfully.

“Now that everything turned out in an unrealistically magical way, can I get an answer?” Tony rumbled sarcastically.

“How about I and Natasha go home, and I pick up Bucky?”

“Ehm. You mean you bring him here.”

(Peter went red in the background.)

“Obviously.”

“Yeah, sure, go,” Tony mumbled as he returned to the files and his thoughts.

Natasha, accompanied by Steve, took the elevator to the ground floor, they jogged down the stairs, and hopped into the car.

“Sam,” Steve nodded. “You met Natasha last time, right?”

“Briefly.”

“She’s Bucky’s ex.”

“You’re extending your network? It’s going great, bud.”

Steve rolled his eyes.

“Actually, just so you know, Natasha is awesome.”

“And Natasha really just wants to be friends with James,” Natasha chimed in, “and she doesn’t have any intentions to fish him away from Steve because she thinks they’re truly happy together, and that’s the only thing that matters.”

Steve stared at the woman. He opened his mouth, then closed it, and finally just beamed at her containedly, radiating his gratitude towards her. Natasha nodded, “it’s the least.”

Arriving at the house, Natasha followed Steve in. He informed Sarah and Bucky about the change of plans. Sarah hugged the woman enthusiastically, and voiced her joy about getting to spend time with her.

Steve turned to the man questioningly.

“I hope it’s not a problem… Tony Stark is the best. If we want this to go the most ideal way possible, he’s the one to turn to.”

“Couldn’t you be my lawyer?” Bucky asked, biting on his lower lip.

“Unfortunately no, Buck. Conflict of interest.”

“Wait, what? You’re staying on Zola’s case?”

“Oh no! Conflict of interest because of you. You know, us being in a relationship…”

“Oh. Right.” Bucky took a moment to think. “This Stark… Do you trust him?”

“Completely.”

“James,” Natasha said, “please.”

Bucky looked at her nervously, and nodded.

“Okay.” He turned to Steve. “You’ll be there, right?”

“All along.”

He crouched down, hugged Sarah, then Natasha, and exited the house with Steve behind him.

The car rolled out to the street right after they got in, and Sam started examining the stranger with narrowed eyes.

“I thought you had better taste, Steve.”

“I thought it was none of your business. Plus Bucky is gorgeous.”

“If this emo style is your thing…”

Steve shook his head.

“Buck, this is Sam, my driver, and sometimes I think my best friend too.”

“Hello,” said Bucky. “Can you move your seat up?”

“No,” said Sam.

“Do you have a problem, Sam?” Steve asked.

“As a matter of fact, I do. I think this man is using you. He manifests out of the blue, making you suddenly be attracted to guys, and after just a weekend you believe you have a wow-so-deep connection because he fed some soppy origin story to you, of which a well-timed, hot ex-girlfriend reassures you too, of course, and voila. Protection for a criminal, free of charge. I must congratulate.”

With widened eyes, Steve was trying to come up with an answer.

Bucky was just staring blankly in front of himself ‒ he knew all that wasn’t true, however he had to admit: it must have seemed so.

“Look,” Steve began, “I won’t try to convince you of the reality of our relationship. It’s enough that I know that what we have is just as real as it was with Peggy, no matter that Bucky is a man and no matter how long we’ve known each other. When he told me his story, I saw that every word was true. And everything’s there in the files and articles, by the way, anywhere you make the effort to look. Sam, I just want him the best, I want him to be happy.” He looked at Bucky. “I want you to be happy. And this being pro bono is the last thing I care about because we’re protecting an innocent man, and that’s always been my goal since I chose the field of law. Locking the bad ones behind bars, keeping the good ones out. And you’re one of the good ones.”

Bucky bit his lip and squeezed Steve’s hand.

“Thank you,” he whispered.

Sam, seeing Steve’s determined trust towards the man, hemmed in surrender. “Amen.” But, just to make it clear, he added, directing it to Bucky: “I don’t like you anyway.”

Bucky grimaced.  _ Me neither. _

“This is a disaster.”

“It  _ is  _ a tragic story.”

“No, your boyfriend’s look is a disaster.”

“Come again?”

“I mean it in a legal way. Steve, you might like this ‘strong, mysterious man who needs to be saved’ look, but the judges won’t be won over with this. We need to get some color on him that day.”

“But‒”

“No buts and self-expression and whatnot. Our goal is to let the judges see that Barnes here is a decent person, only broken awfully, but trying the very best he can to gather the pieces of his life and be a productive member of society.”

“This is the truth.”

“Yeah, but Steve, you know that even though you’re sweet enough to not judge by looks but instead actually make an effort to get to know the person, unfortunately that is not how law works.”

Steve nodded in defeat.

“So then.” Tony interlaced his fingers on the table in front of himself. “Barnes, it’s your turn. Let’s find something that saves you from a death sentence.”

“Tony!”

“Steve?”

“A little softer?”

“No,” said Tony. “He needs to be prepared. Nobody’s gonna go easy on you,” he told Bucky. “Are you ready?”

He nodded.

“I’ve been through much worse,” he said to Steve with a sour smile.

Steve gave his hands a squeeze.

“Aww,” said Tony dryly. “Focus, Sleeping Beauty.”

Bucky let go of Steve’s hands, and turned back to Tony.

“Let’s start with the obvious. It’s a shot in the dark, but after all the trying events you had to get through, it would be a natural human reaction if some of them stayed with you or kept coming back in some form. Are there areas in your life where these happenings affect you negatively?

Bucky fixed his eyes on his nails that he kept picking. “Yes.”

“For example?”

He remained silent.

“Look, it’d be really important for me to know about these things. Do I have to repeat what’s on stake here? Barnes. I’m on your side.”

Bucky braced himself and glared out to a neutral direction.

“I get… blackouts. Just like I used to, when I didn’t know what I was doing. They’ve only been a few minutes these past months. And I sleep badly. Not a lot, either. Because of the nightmares.”

Steve glanced at Tony who seemed sympathetic for a moment.

“This was easier than I thought. My very first guess! Thank you for sharing these with me. Very obvious PTSD, and I’m assuming depression too, but let this be decided by a professional. Anyways, we’ve got our main argument to build on. And you,” he slid a card to Bucky from one of the pre-prepared stocks, “book an emergency appointment with Dr. Xavier.”

Bucky jerked his head up in fear. “A psychiatrist?” He looked at Steve. “You never said anything about that.”

“This is not only necessary for your case, Buck, but for you to get better, too. Please. I promise there won’t be more requests, only these few very important ones.”

“I’ve been drugged for years. I had enough. I don’t care if it’s legal or illegal‒”

“Dr. Xavier is an excellent doctor with extensive knowledge, and, by the way, he’s very broad-minded as well,” said Tony. “I think you’ll be able to work out a solution together that is manageable for both of you. Book an appointment, and decide afterwards. Goes without saying, nothing is compulsory.”

After the meeting, Bucky shyly asked if Steve would welcome him for the night because he didn’t want to be alone (he wanted to be with  _ Steve _ ). Steve reassured him that he was welcome any time, so they entered the house together.

They talked to Natasha for a while, but Bucky’s energy level was operating on a pretty low level, so she said goodbye to Sarah and left to let him rest.

Steve made his daughter do her night routine, then they read some pages together until her eyes closed.

He let out a long, deep breath and all the tension of the day with it, and stepped into his room where he found an exhausted Bucky spread out on the bed.

Steve made his way to the closet, peeled the clothes off of himself, got into his pajamas, and climbed in the bed. Raising himself on one elbow, he started stroking the wavy hair of his boyfriend.

“I don’t know if I’m worth all this to you,” said Bucky.

“What you did all those years, it wasn’t you. You didn’t have a choice.”

“I know… but I did it.”

“Everything’s gonna be alright. You’re gonna be alright,” Steve whispered just as much to Bucky as to himself.

Everything’s gonna be alright. Everything’s gonna be alright and everything’s gonna be okay, in fact, everything’s gonna be great, and he’s not gonna lose him too, he doesn’t want to, he can’t. They stay together until the end of the line.

Steve inched closer, put an arm around the man, who then, in response, snuggled his head into his chest, and Steve started to stoke small circles on Bucky’s back. For a while, they were just silently breathing together, Bucky to Steve’s heart and Steve to Bucky’s hair.

Then Bucky murmured into Steve’s chest: “This is really good.”

Steve hummed peacefully. “My mom used to do this when I couldn’t sleep. Either because I was too stressed out or because I was too weak. Usually both.”

“Weak?”

“As a child, and in the most part of my teenagerhood, I had a serious illness which kept me weak all the time. And, in addition, terribly small and thin. I’ll show you photos,” Steve smiled.

“But you’re fine now?”

“Yes, I fought hard, and I managed to win against the illness. Plus puberty hit in.”

“You’re lucky,” Bucky mumbled.

“Well, I wasn’t exactly popular in school.”

“I can imagine. I’m sorry.”

Steve shrugged. “It’s not a big deal.”

“I mean I’m sorry for getting all the attention when clearly you also have tough memories.”

Steve laughed lightly. “Dummy.”

They fell asleep like this, breathing peacefully, and Steve held Bucky so softly and protectively as he possibly could; this beautiful soul whom he was lucky enough to meet, and who has experienced the worst of the world ‒ he wanted to show him all the good ones too, and hide him from further bad ones. It’s enough now, it’s enough. He wanted to hug him and hold him forever, and protect and protect from everything he was going to face.

_ “Buck?” _

_ “Hm?” _

_ “I love you.” _

_ “That’s obvious.” _

_ “Oh.” _

Two days later Bucky met Dr. Charles Xavier who was able to squeeze him into his tight schedule after hearing he was sent by Stark urgently. That night, he enthusiastically told Steve all the interesting parts of their conversation, for example that the doctor had a  _ male spouse, _ him being Erik Lehnsherr ‒ yes,  _ that  _ Erik Lehnsherr. This, for some reason, moved and hugely encouraged Bucky.

They had amazing sex in lights of that.

Steve and Bucky also had a conversation about the relationship of Natasha and Bucky that Steve indicated with the utmost carefulness. He didn’t want to seem too jealous, because he was not, or didn’t want to discourage him from becoming friends with her again; during this talk, Bucky informed Steve about his friendship with Natasha, which was just that, friendship. Steve was relieved.

And they had amazing sex.

The case against the indignant Zola, by the way, was going pretty well. It was mainly led by Tony but the team (Steve, Peter, Natasha, and Bucky himself, of course) helped whenever and however they could, so in reality all of them worked together on conquering HYDRA. Bucky piously admitted how touched he was by all this caring.

And they had sex again.

After only roughly a month of him visiting Dr. Xavier and the case progressing positively, Steve was already able to see the change in Bucky: he was just a slightly lighter, freer, happier, and so Steve too. He wanted to lock these moments into his heart and brain and all the parts of his body, cherish them forever and ever, because these seemingly small and insignificant moments they had the past weeks meant more to him than any word they could have said to each other.

The walks together with Bucky and Sarah, the Activity night they had organized on a Friday afternoon (not only Nat and Peter had come but Tony and Pepper too, who, as it had turned out, were a couple now; sadly Sam had said no), the afternoon when Sarah and Bucky had watched some Disney movie while dressed as princesses, and the dinners together; the joyful moment when Steve had discovered Bucky’s toothbrush now had a reserved place in the bathroom and that a stock of Bucky-clothes had appeared in his closet, or Bucky and Sarah and Steve cooking together, even though it had become clear at the very first instance that out of the three of them, Steve was the only one who knew his way around the kitchen.

“Buck?”

“Hm?”

“I love you.”

“That’s obvious.”

“Oh.”

“Oh?”

“You know, people say that back. Especially at first. This is kind of a big deal.”

“I thought it was obvious. I love you too, Steve.”

“No, don’t say it back because you have to!”

“I’m not saying it because I have to. Should I convince you now?”

“Hm… Please.”

The next day Natasha came over to introduce her new boyfriend.

The first thing Bucky noticed was his huge nose which he wasn’t able to tear his gaze from after this realization. Other than that, he seemed like a nice fella.

“So what do you do, Clint?” Steve asked.

“I’m managing a farm.”

“Oh, that must be interesting.”

“It is. And peaceful.”

“You’ll need that with Nat,” Bucky said, just to not be too quiet.

“Aww, you’re so nice,” Natasha grimaced angelically.

“Well duh. It’s true. You’re not famous for your peacefulness.”

“I’m starting to notice that,” Clint admitted, and gave a heartfelt stroke to Natasha’s back. “But life needs a bit of excitement too, huh?”

For a moment, Natasha looked like a fragile woman whose heart had been won over. Just for a quick moment.

Natasha had been spending a lot of time in the house these past weeks. She often took over childcare from Bucky when he had an appointment for a meeting or anything, but she was happy to be with Sarah just in general, without any specific reason.

Steve had proposed the idea of Bucky officially moving in, and also that they could assign the nanny job to Natasha instead, so Bucky could focus on getting better. Plus he should be finding hobbies anyways. Bucky had happily moved in, of course, but regarding the job and hobbies, he wasn’t so sure. After all, he had given in when Dr. Xavier’s opinion also aligned with Steve’s, so Natasha had got the job and Bucky had left his apartment.

Then he began the hobby-search. In the next few weeks, he had attended classes, presentations, shows, gatherings, and other various and very diverse events.

He had tried out a yoga class, to which he had managed to get Steve to go too, who had made friends with all the moms there afterwards, and he was too polite to not stay to talk to them (but Bucky could easily imagine he was actually enjoying the conversations). The moms were drooling around his boyfriend for more than half an hour while he was languidly scanning through the ads pinned to the board outside. His looks and aura weren’t so charming to make the moms gather around him. Or it just hadn’t been a good first impression to tear the mattress into half with his metal arm when trying to pull off the very first pose. Or the metal arm just in itself.

Anyhow, he didn’t mind not getting that much attention at all.

Besides this, there was that two-day Viking fest. He had only gone because he had been curious to try mead.

He did feel more at home there than in the pastel-colored yoga studio. In fact, he had made a friend too, for which he had been very proud of himself. (He had bragged about it to Dr. Xavier too.) Thor, according to him, had been visiting Viking events because of his northern ancestors. He had said he would’ve liked to live the Viking life for real too.

Bucky had shared that he, too, was often feeling like he’d been born into the wrong century, then he had taken a big gulp from the mead. Followed immediately by almost spitting it out. After he had, finally, managed to get it down his throat, he had mumbled with a sour face:

“But the honey in it…”

Accompanied by his deep, thundering laughter, Thor had slapped him in the back ‒ Bucky had squeaked discreetly ‒, and had tried to comfort him by saying he would get used to it. Then he had tilted his head back, poured the entire content of his huge glass down his throat (Bucky almost did not believe it), and had elegantly wiped his mouth with his forearm.

Bucky was convinced of the existence of Thor’s Viking genetics.

He had looked for jobs too, or at least tried to, but nothing had actually moved him; he had gone to interviews and trial days before giving up ‒ Steve had assured him that it was completely okay to let himself relax for now, seeing that it was something he hadn’t been able to do for a long time.

He had only added silently that maybe never. He wasn’t sure of that.

“But you know, I just couldn’t believe it. Putting a twist like that in it…”

“They were hinting at it in the previous book. And this seems like the only manageable option from the strategic point of view too.”

“Yeah, you’ve got a point.”

The conversation was interrupted by the ringing of Steve’s phone. As he pulled it out of his pocket, he apologized to Sam.

“Steve Rogers here.”

“Mr. Rogers, I’m Dr. Charles Xavier. I’m contacting you in relation to one of my clients, James Barnes?”

“I’ve heard a great lot about you, Dr. Xavier. How may I help you?”

“James had his usual spot booked for 6 pm today, but he never showed up, and I can’t seem to reach him on the phone either. This comes across quite out-of-character from him. I would just like to ask if you’re aware of any obstacle he might have faced today that prevented him from attending his appointment today, and, additionally, if I should keep the spot for next week reserved for him?”

Steve glanced on his watch in confusion. It was past seven.

“I’m afraid I can’t offer any explanation yet. Could I maybe call you back later today or tomorrow?”

“Naturally. I’ll be waiting for your call. Have a nice evening, Mr. Rogers.”

Steve put away his phone nervously. There was a bad gut feeling approaching him that followed him all the way home. He practically ran into the house, and immediately scanned the entire place. Bucky was nowhere to be found, Natasha, on the other hand, watched the whole scene though.

“Where’s Bucky?” Steve threw the question at her without beating around the bush.

The corner of her mouth twitched. “I don’t know.” Her voice faded at the end of the word.

Two pairs of eyes full of fear were staring at one another for a while, until the point when Steve dropped down to the armchair behind him.

“He never showed up to his appointment at Dr. X. Who, by the way, can’t reach him.”

“I haven’t seen him all day… He didn’t say anything to me yesterday about his plans for today. You?”

“Nothing. And he’s not here either. Nat… something’s not right.”

Natasha walked closer and squatted in front of Steve. “James is a big boy. Strong too. He can take care of himself. But it can be anything though. Try not to panic, okay? Maybe he just forgot to mention a theatre play or something.”

Steve sighed. “Maybe,” he said but didn’t believe it.

“Have you been fighting recently?”

“Everything was fine.”

“Maybe misunderstood something, or there was something hurting him anyways… Maybe he’s sleeping at Thor’s because he needs some space and time, and he’ll be in touch tomorrow.”

“He would’ve gone to his appointment with Dr. X. He adores that man.”

“Maybe he’s angry with him too. Steve, we don’t know what’s going on. We can’t. But everything’s gonna be alright, okay?”

Steve mumbled something resembling “okay.”

“Sarah’s asleep already, I hope it’s okay. She was pretty tired.”

“Thank you.”

“This is my job. Now, go to bed. You’re tired too.”

“Nat?”

“Hm?”

“Will you try to call him too?”

A suggesting smile curled on Natasha’s face. “That’s the least I’m gonna do.”

She disappeared from the house before Steve’s worry-fogged brain could have grasped her words.

And Bucky disappeared before Steve’s worry-fogged brain could have grasped what was happening.


	8. “the land of the free and the home of the brave”

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There ya go, lads and lasses, le final chapter :))  
> Just so you know, it's not even nearly the best, but I wrote it, edited it, deleted the whole thing, then re-wrote it. The characters just wouldn't do anything else other than this, for the love of anyone or anything above. So here it is. I don't think it's very bad, I just expected better.  
> Nonetheless, personally I'm proud of myself for sticking to something for this long.  
> That's it. Enjoy! :))

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Magyarul: { [Egy megoldás volt csak 8.](https://andweweremadlyinlove.blogspot.com/2021/03/egy-megoldas-volt-csak-8.html) }

Steve was standing on the front porch with a glass of wine in one hand. The temperature was still okay enough to wear only a t-shirt, even in the evening, but he hugged himself with his other arm for warmth. Winter was coming.

Steve didn’t want any winter though, other than that one from years ago when the Winter Soldier himself marched into his life ‒ but that one, that one could go on and on, on repeat.

He stared into the blood red liquid.

Guilt kept crawling back to him ‒ in the most unexpected moments, from the most unrelated things, he remembered the charming face, the inexperienced laugh, the suggestive sparkle in those blue, oh so blue eyes… Bucky, his Bucky altogether, that wonderful man he’d promised protection to and failed awfully. This terrible, paralysing guilt didn’t seem to fade over the years, and he did, in fact, deserve it for not saving Bucky.

Steve had ceremonially swore to Natasha around the time that he’s never to date again. Most probably, she hadn’t taken him seriously, just put it on the account of his momentary (and valid) lethargy. However she started asking about it again recently, so Steve repeated his vow: he’s never _ever_ going to date.

Because what had his love life been like so far? Pitiful, that’s what. There was a woman he’d loved more than anything ‒ he lost her. There was a woman who’d kissed him ‒ he lost her. And there was a man who meant more than anything to him ‒ he lost him.

So when Natasha had requested to know the reason behind the vow, his reply was: “I don’t want to cause any more pain.”

As if his body was trying to remind him of something, he shivered, and went back into the house. Sarah’s voice was coming from the closed and poster-covered door at the end of the hallway; she was on the phone with one of her friends.

Steve headed to the kitchen, and placed the glass on the counter. He eyed the pile of dirty dishes for a few minutes before getting to it with a sigh. Even his relationship with washing the dishes had been shaky since. (There had been a time period of being broken up entirely.)

The strangest thing was that shortly before Bucky’s disappearance, this had been the “usual,” this state of shallow existence he was doing now ‒ but that was the point when Steve had realized how much he’d grown accustomed to the man’s presence. The small, unstable pile of Bucky-clothes had been left on a shelf in Steve’s closet (and been there ever since); everything had been the same, the _usual,_ except that Bucky himself was gone. Even though he’d tried persistently, he hadn’t been able to reach him through the phone, and neither could Natasha. (Although she’d used different methods, to which methods Steve, after careful consideration, had finally decided to turn a blind eye, registering the delicacy of the situation.)

Bucky had disappeared. They hadn’t been able to find the trail he’d left on. They’d been trying for a long while ‒ and Steve was stubbornly convinced that they were still on it.

Life had continued to go on otherwise, however hard Steve was feeling the opposite way. He’d gone to the office the next day, and on the next after that, and so on. Only after about a week had he taken a few vacation days when there still hadn’t been any news about Bucky, but Zola and his company had also vanished suddenly and, of course, very surprisingly, thus making Steve develop an exceptionally uneasy feeling.

Natasha called that week “rock bottom.” Personally, he’d say that for the entirety of the past years and God knows how much to come.

Finishing the dishes, he took a rushed shower, and with a towel around his waist, he dropped by Sarah’s room to quickly remind her about bedtime.

What he wasn’t expecting though was that instead of being on the phone in the regular ‒ _old school_ ‒ sense, in this case the camera was also involved in the matter.

“Dad!” Sarah snapped angrily as she hurried to cover her laptop’s camera.

Steve coughed perplexedly, but uttered the fatherly warning nonetheless.

Distancing himself from the room, he was thinking about _these kids nowadays_ and their technology, but the undisguised scream of excitement from his daughter’s friend still reached his ears: “Wow, your dad’s literally so hot!”

Steve blushed. These kids nowadays…

He spent at least half an hour just lying in bed, rigidly staring at the right side of it, and he couldn’t decide if he was seeing Peggy there, or Bucky, or maybe both of them. Could all three of them fit in the bed? Probably. Would they like each other? Steve saw two options: they would either politely co-exist or be passionately hateful. He couldn’t really imagine a scenario where one would genuinely like the other. Anyhow, although silent and very faded, both of them were lying there in bed with him now, and Steve couldn’t choose. He didn’t even _want_ to.

He felt his lungs shrinking, as if an iron fist was clutching his chest so strongly that he briefly pondered the idea of his childhood illness being back.

The sound of hesitant knocking interrupted his train of melancholic thoughts.

He got up and opened the door. His daughter was standing in front of it, with her eyes fixed on the floor and with her body in a weird position.

“What’s the matter, honey?”

“Uhm… I think I got it.”

“Got what…?”

Embarrassed, Sarah pulled her hands from behind her back, in which she was holding a pair of panties. One section of the fabric was colored red by a stain.

“Oh,” said Steve. Then, very helpfully, stared at his daughter. All of him was wishing for Peggy to be there now.

Sarah rolled her eyes. “Relax, we’ve been over this with Nat. I just need pads.”

“Oh,” said Steve again, now more with relief. “Uhm… and until I get back?”

“Dad! Come on… Just hurry.”

Although not entirely understanding the situation, Steve pressed a kiss on the top of her head which earned him a grimace in return, and quickly put on a pullover and a pair of pants he declared more viable than his checkered pajamas.

While putting on his shoes, he was wondering if the corner store would still be open, and if yes, whether they sell this kind of thing or not. He’d never paid attention to this before. He reached the conclusion to go by foot because according to his best guess, surely it was still open.

It was. He did find pads too. Multiple types of the thing, in fact. He stood around for a little while before ‒ being the smart man he was ‒ concluding that really the only difference was in brand and size, so he grabbed the smallest one that he deemed suitable for a little girl like his daughter, and lined up to pay.

While waiting for his turn, he saw a metallic gleam from the corner of his eye. He jerked his head in its direction. There was a man whose hat covered his face, and his dark clothes unfortunately hid his arms too. Hands in the pockets. His posture appeared familiar, but not entirely.

He shook his head and turned back to the queue. The young woman in front of him was about to pay.

This had happened many times in the past years: he caught every metallic gleam, he stared at every dark-clothed individual, and he’d approached several men who had a familiar posture, hair, voice, anything really.

Whenever this had happened with Sarah being present, he’d witnessed her eyes going soft. Tears used to fill her eyes too.

After Bucky’s disappearance, Sarah had started weeping during the bedtime story on multiple occasions, resulting in Steve crawling into the small bed, her curling up to him, and falling asleep with her fists gripping his t-shirt. She’d last acted like this when she’d lost Peggy. The only difference was that this was a slightly lighter, but very similar reaction nonetheless. And when this had dawned upon him was when he had actually realized just how much she’d come to love Bucky.

“Sir? Sir, you’re next in line.”

Steve raised his eyes to the cashier, and apologetically handed her the pack of pads.

Exiting the store, he found himself in front of the wide back of the dark-clothed man. He politely tried to go around him, only to receive, seemingly automatically, a fist in his stomach.

Steve crouched a little and coughed with dignity.

“Sorry,” he apologized due to his well-mannered personality, “just trying to go ‘round you.”

From this bent position, he was able to take a careful peek at the man’s face under the hat. His eyes widened, and that poor heart of his not only skipped a beat but nearly stopped.

“Bucky?”

Steve thought he was dreaming, or seeing a ghost, but the first one’s only a figure of speech (in reality surely everyone was aware of being awake… right?), and ghosts were a concept he didn’t believe in.

The man narrowed his eyes ‒ those beautiful blue eyes… ‒ and looked properly confused.

“Who the hell is Bucky?”

Bucky reached into the paper bag he was holding, pulled out a plum, and took a bite. The reflection of a street lamp appeared on his hand.

“’m James. Sorry for that previous move. You know, reflexes.”

With that, he turned away and went on his merry way. The way Steve was going too, merry or not.

“James, yes, sorry. I forgot only I was calling you Bucky. And Sarah, of course. Is it a common thing with you now, punching people in the stomach?”

The man glanced at him suspiciously. “Do we know each other?”

Steve frowned. “Are you kidding?”

“Wouldn’t dream of it.”

“Steve Rogers. We’ve lived together… among other things. Then you were gone. Natasha’s been worried too, you know. However strong she’s trying to look, I know she hates that she’s lost you again. I’ve started to think you’re dead…”

“Sorry, I don’t know who you are. That Sarah either. Natasha does ring a bell.”

“Red-haired, fierce, strong… She was your girlfriend before me. I mean I wasn’t your girlfriend… I’m‒”

The man was watching him with a raised eyebrow but said nothing.

“Where have you been, Buck?” Steve blurted out.

“Took a fucking vacation,” he rumbled.

“Language,” Steve mumbled, and kicked a stone.

When he raised his head, he didn’t see Bucky anymore. So he got to the point of _hallucinating_ Bucky, huh? Was he talking to himself all these past minutes?

But then, looking around, he spotted him a few steps back, rooted. (And because of this, he felt relief wash over him for more reasons than one.)

“Steve?”

“Bucky.”

“Something‒” he mumbled, staring into the distance. “Sarah and me, on the floor‒ on a rug… You in the door. Without this beard. There’s children’s music.”

Steve smiled.

Bucky shook his head and resumed the walk. He extended his arm with the paper bag in it. “Plums?”

“No, thanks.”

“Sarah, she’s your daughter, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Ours?”

Steve looked at him with furrowed brows. “No.”

“Alright.”

They were silent for the rest of the walk.

When they reached Steve’s house that had served as a home for Bucky too for a period of time, surprisingly enough it was Bucky who stopped first. He outright freezed and stared at the building, and Steve at him.

After a few minutes, he spoke: “Bucky?”

The man twitched and lowered his gaze to the ground in a rush. “I don’t know why I came here. For some reason… I thought I lived here. I’ll go now. Good night.”

“Wait,” Steve waved an arm after him which he instinctively blocked. Steve yanked his arm away. “Have a pen?”

Frowning, Bucky materialized one from the pocket of his coat.

Steve reached for his hand slowly and carefully, and scribbled his number on it.

“We’re all worried about you. We all want to help. Call me when you’re ready.”

From somewhere inside, Bucky projected a faint smile, which the man who currently possessed his body evidently couldn’t process, nor understand. He turned with confusion in his eyes, and walked away.

Steve stood around a bit more. Watching the figure in the distance, he wondered what could’ve possibly happened to him, but when the accusatory, acidic feeling started crawling up his throat, he turned around and went inside.

Sarah’s demanding shout greeted him there: “What took you so long? I’m frozen to the toilet!”

Steve chuckled, and covering his eyes (successfully preventing an annoyed “dad!” with this) he marched into the bathroom, handed the plastic bag to his daughter, and marched out of the bathroom.

Before he could’ve gotten too far though, he did get an annoyed “dad!” with an addition: “These are _panty liners!”_

Steve, with furrowed brows, didn’t understand the situation at all.

The final result of the conversation was him literally running to the store to catch the few minutes left before closing time, and buying a pack of _actual_ pads while apologizing left and right.

He was drowning in an endless pool of salty water. For a long, long time, he was struggling hard among the waves while sneaky little drops of water were filling his lungs more and more. He was flailing around bonelessly until everything went dark.

The last thing he felt was sinking.

When he opened his eyes, he was lying in the dirt of a bleak shore. The reflexive, watery cough from somewhere deep in his lungs made his whole body tremble.

He sat up. He was in his room.

He still had the urge to cough.

He tried to gather the messages of his senses. Sight: his dark room; smell: seasalt air freshener; hearing: sharp tune; touch: the softness of bedsheets.

Looking to the side, he grabbed his phone, and with a still (and already) fast-beating heart tapped on the button to accept the call.

“Steve?” came the husky voice. “Steve, I’m in front of the house.”

So Steve got up, clicked on the lamp, and tiptoed through the house. In the door, he waved for Bucky to come in. The guy on the other side of the street looked nearly indistinguishable from a sculpture.

Once inside, he immediately marched down the hallway, and Steve realized with surprise how easily he found his way to the bedroom, where he dropped down on the edge of the bed.

Steve did the same, and incidentally shot a quick glance at the clock while doing so. Past 4 AM.

They sat there for a while in silence, only the ticking of the clock could be heard, and the soft sound of Bucky picking on his jeans.

“I’m sorry for disappearing,” he said finally, breaking the short sentence into two halves by clearing his throat in the middle.

Steve turned to him full-frontal. “We’ve been nothing but worried about you, Buck.”

He wanted to ask again about what had happened, but decided against it this time.

Bucky stared at the wall in front of him. “Ehm. I think I should book another appointment with Dr. X.”

Steve smiled. “That’s a great idea, Buck.”

The man looked at him, deeply into his eyes, and Steve saw so ineffably heartbreaking things in them that he had to extend his arm to at least squeeze Bucky’s hand. Bucky squeezed it back.

Steve leaned forward with a slightly relieved sigh, and pulled him into a hug; at first, Bucky’s arms were hanging from his shoulders helplessly, then he awkwardly placed them on Steve’s back.

“I’m so happy you’re here,” whispered Steve.

“I’m sorry I didn’t warn you,” murmured Bucky.

Steve shut his eyes very tight. “I’m always happy to see you.”

“I mean years ago.”

And that was the point when Steve couldn’t hold his tears back anymore.

Being the proud man he was, crying wasn’t something he did a lot of, and when he did get overwhelmed with the urge, he wouldn’t let anyone see it.

Bucky was different though. Bucky had become his family, Bucky had become his friend, and he wasn’t ashamed of anything in front of him. He was able to feel alone with Bucky, in the most positive way possible. He didn’t have to hold anything back with him.

Bucky pulled him closer. Stroking his head, he kept murmuring something that resembled the words “I’m sorry” over and over and over again until Steve calmed down. But it was possible that Steve just imagined it.

When he lifted his head back up from the soaked t-shirt of Bucky, he just said, looking in his eyes: “Everything’s gonna be okay.”

And he smiled. Because yes, Bucky was here now, and he wasn’t letting go of him ever again, and he was going to protect him with everything he’s got, and everything was going to be okay.

  
_O say can you see by the dawn’s early light_   
_What so proudly we hailed at the twilight’s last gleaming_   
_Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight_   
_O’er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming?_   
_And the rocket’s red glare, the bombs bursting in air_   
_Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there_   
_O say does that star-spangled banner yet wave_   
_O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave_


End file.
